ArchivedLogs:Night-Demons

Night-Demons
Dramatis Personae Rahne, Peter
In Absentia	2013-04-14 Rahne and Peter meet during GHOST-HUNT, discuss demons / religion.
Location <XS> Second Floor Hall
The main hallway of the second floor runs lengthwise through the building, secondary corridors branching off at regular intervals. Tall windows at either end allow daylight to filter in, while rows of recessed lights in the ceiling bathe the hall with an incandescent glow come nighttime. The hardwood floor has a slight creak to it. Ghosts are not real. So says Peter. So the instant someone tells him that Xavier's is haunted, Peter's face does this: 'D:<'. And that very night, he sets out to prove them so utterly, completely, and /brilliantly/ wrong. With /science/. Actually, that might not work as well as Peter thinks. But he's armed - a camera around his neck, a flashlight in his mouth. Clad in his black hoodie, black dress slacks, and black tabi socks - no mask, though. But otherwise? Prepared for SNEAKINGS. He's currently sneak-sneak-sneaking down one of Xavier's hallways. Not by walking down it - but by /scuttling/ along the point where the wall meets the ceiling. Super-quiet. Eyes narrowed. Scuttle, scuttle. Ghosts are maybe quite possibly real. So thinks Rahne. But she's not a girl with a gab for gossip, and so the rumor of Xavier's being haunted hasn't quite reached her ears yet. She is, though, also attempting to sneak down the hallway, because it is /after/ curfew and she is terrible for breaking it, but also she wanted some good, Scottish tea. Which is kept in the kitchen. So here she is, sneaking in a more usual method, by quick-shuffling in socked feet along the floor. She is not really dressed for it, though, besides the socks; flannel pajama pants and a heavy, oversized sweatshirt are not really sneaky articles of clothing. Also she has to make sure she doesn't spill her tea. Also also, the shock of flaming red hair she sports. But otherwise, compared to the average teenager? Rahne is actually pretty sneaky. Small, quick, light on her feet, and not expecting to run into anyone or anything. And /THEN/. "Aha!" FLASH. FLASH. FLASH. Three quick, successive flashes of Peter's mini-camera; the flashlight has been spat out and landed with a whump on the carpeted floor. Upon catching sight of Rahne - along with her head of red hair - he /instantly/ made the logical assumption: GHOST. Or, rather, ghost imitator. And so the camera he's armed with takes three shots of Rahne, probably in a series of ever-increasing expressions of shock and horror. Peter himself is attached to the wall above her, having just shifted to press his back against it, using his feet to prop himself up - so he can use both hands to take the pictures. A moment after, though, and he'll frown, peeking over the camera: "...Rahne? /You're/ the ghost?" ConfusedPeter. Both shout and bright, flashing lights from location as of yet unidentified get the response you might expect from the shy, wee Scot: she let's out a squeak of surprise, too caught in the throat to be the shriek it wanted to be, and nearly falls over herself trying to backpedal away, one sock scrunching up on her sole as she somehow manages to stay on her feet. She also spills quite a lot of her tea. "Sweet baby Jesus!" she exclaims, too flustered and adrenalined up to even clap a hand over her mouth for it. "Are ye aff yer heid?! Gonnae nae do that!" she hurls after in a hiss, once she identifies who just scared the bejesus out of her. Just um. Give her a moment to settle there. If Peter pays really close attention, he'll catch the gleam of inhuman shine to her eyes, a faint sprouting of fur on her exposed skin, which she works on getting rid of. Peter's looking at the pictures, actually. Nose scrunched, still up on the wall, thumbing through the photographs - oh, huh, Rahne looks - is that FUR? In response to Rahne's exclamation - Peter glances up, briefly, frowning rather sternly: "Sorry. Um, sorry. I thought you were a ghost. Wait you aren't the ghost, right? Because I think they said the ghost had red hair, but she's also transparent and you aren't transparent, you're just /fuzzy/," and this gets Peter to actually scuttle /back/ a foot or two. "...sorry, sorry, I was expecting - ghost. Not werewolf." FLUSTERED. Rahne looks down at the mess that was going to be her wonderful cup of tea, a frown showing about it. She considers what's left in the mug, and is about to take a sip when Peter starts apologizing in a very... Petery way. In their past encounters, this has usually just served to make the wee Scot blush with embarrassment, but this time around, apparently her embarrassment at him pointing out that she's fuzzy and a werewolf awakens her temper. Head snapping up, she narrows her eyes and glares at him. "Ooooh!" she sounds with a small fury, free hand clenched into a fist at her side as she actually stomps a socked foot. "I oughta skelp ye! Aumnae fuzzy an'aumnae a werewolf, ya... riddy coo!" This apparently does not help her to unfuzzy any, though. Because she still is. And practically bristling. Peter releases the camera and /scuttles/. He's surprisingly fast on that wall; when he darts head-down toward the floor, he releases his feet - flipping down to the carpet. THUD. And then he's facing all the fuzzy fury that Rahne has to offer - wide-eyed and blinking. Hands up to ward her off. "Whoa, whoa, I'm - you /are/ fuzzy," he says, though it has a defensive tone to it. "I mean, you are getting fuzzy and your fuzz is /bristling/ and it's actually kinda /cool/ and I'm sorry I called you a werewolf I thought you were cool with werewolf -" Hop, hop. "- and jeez you are /really/ angry! I can get you another tea! Should I get you another tea?" Then, glancing around rapidly. "We should probably be /quiet/ because I don't think we're supposed to be out here--" Even with him joining her on the floor, the wee Scot still glares upwards at Peter. "Aumnae!" she continues to argue, though... really it's just a pride point, now, with Rahne struggling to hang onto her anger in worry that shame will take its place. It does, anyway, this white hot moment of her temper apparently just a flash in the pan. With her scowl wavering, she looks back down. At the tea on the floor. "I should clean it up," she says, voice a little quieter. She then lifts her foot up so she can fix the scrunched sock. After a beat, quieter still, she repeats, "Aumnae a werewolf." Peter frowns at what he has wrought. When she mentions cleaning it up - he darts forward - using his sleeve to mop up the carpet. "I'm sorry," he repeats, crouched low and rubbing, his hand shoved up his sleeve. Rub, rub. Rub, rub. "You're not a - I mean, you're just a mutant, like me. I didn't realize - I say dumb stuff sometimes. Without thinking about it. I'm sorry. I think it's - kind of cool? But, uh, I could understand if /you/ didn't like it. Didn't think it was cool." Well, maybe not. Peter thinks /all/ powers are cool. Kind of universally. "Ach," she sounds, taking a step back with a blink when he darts forward to try to mop up the tea. "Yer jes' goon ta rub it in that way," Rahne says, tone completely gentle about it, a little apologetic. Almost a trick of the eye, the thin sheen of fur she's been stuck with just kind of... reabsorbs, melts away. "It's all right," the wee Scot says, though she does add, "Though what on God's green earth were ya doin', hangin' on the ceiling an' takin' pictures o' unsuspectin' folk?" "I thought that was the point you rub it in until no one can see it how /else/ do you clean carpets?" Peter asks, genuinely perplexed. He pauses to look up at Rahne, then up at the wall he had been perched on - then back to Rahne. "Oh," he says, rather sheepishly. "Ghost-hunting. There was - some of the students said they saw a red-headed ghost-lady wandering the halls at night. And I wanted to prove them /wrong/, so..." He jingles the camera softly. Looking a little shiftily from left to right. "Ach, nae," she says, an actual, small bit of a laugh huffed out with the words, if you can believe it. "Rubbin' it in is the worse thing ye kin do. Blot it up, an' then ya kin use vinegar. Or detergent. But mix 'em with some watar, first." Rahne is no slouch when it comes to cleaning. She had her childhood years to master tackling any and all kinds of stains. Mention of a ghost, though, distracts her from her cleaning thoughts. "Ghost?" she questions, free hand sneaking up automatically to catch the small gold cross she always wears. "Around here?" "Oh I have vinegar," Peter says, and at /ONCE/ his backpack - a slim little nylon sack that matches his hoodie - is slumped off his back, and he is scrounging inside of it, pulling out... a spritzer bottle? Filled with vinegar? Apparently so. He uses his sleeve to /blot/ instead of /scrub/, now. "And yeah, a ghost, but it's all just nonsense -- ghosts are /rebonkular/, they're totes not real, just a bunch of hufflepuffle kiddy-town noise." AND THAT'S THAT. "I was gonna prove them all wrong, show it was - I dunno - somebody bein' all sneaky with mutant powers? But they mentioned she's transparent and you aren't transparent. They said she has red hair though." Dab, dab, dab. "I saw you had red hair and was like 'AH-HA, GHOST DISGUISE' and kinda jumped the gun with the camera." Rahne takes a moment to be baffled by him just randomly carrying around vinegar with him, but then her memory catches up to things as she vaguely remembers him mentioning it when they bumped into each other in the woods. Well, isn't that fortunate for the carpet. She considers the spray bottle a moment, and then advices, "Spritz it a bit an' let it sit a few minutes 'fore ya go wiping it up." A brief, forlorn look goes to her empty mug, but oh well. "Yer huntin' for ghosts when ya dinnae believe in 'em?" she questions. Because that's kind of funny, honestly. Spritz, spritz. Peter shifts around and props his back up against the wall, staying crouched; he blinks owlishly up at Rahne when she mentions him hunting ghosts despite not believing in them. "Well, I mean, obviously it's /something/," Peter says, maybe with just an ounce of defensiveness! "Just - um - it's probably a mutant. Doing something. Mutant-y. Just, everybody's all 'oooo GHOSTS' and I'm like, PSSSH, ghosts aren't /real/ -duh-. But, uh, yeah. Maybe I didn't think this plan out entirely. I mean even if I got a picture of a transparent person that wouldn't prove ghosts aren't real it'd just prove we have transparent people in our halls. And maybe people would think they're a ghost. Buh." Eyebrows. Jamming together. Thinking. "I guess you can't prove a negative," he finally relents. She wrinkles her nose just a touch at the initial smell of the vinegar, before adjusting and accepting its existence. Vinegar, after all, is grand. It does so many things, even if it is a bit pungent for a sensitive sense of smell. Maybe not quite comfortable standing when someone else is down low, Rahne follows Peter's example by using the wall as a backrest. She slides down it to sit, legs tucked in. "Ya dinnae believe in a lot o' things, do ye?" she asks, after having studied him a long moment. It's a pretty personal question, which she realizes too late, and a touch of color pricks at her cheeks. But it's not as if she can take it back, now. "No," Peter agrees, frowning a little at this. Apparently, personal questions Do Not Bother Peter. Or maybe he doesn't even /think/ of it as a personal question. "I don't - I mean, my folks - they believe in that stuff. My uncle always said I should keep an open mind - but I can't. I mean, for some stuff, yeah - but not for stuff like ghosts, or an afterlife, or anything like that. I used to," Peter adds, "when I was younger? And I'd make all these weird /bets/ with God. Like, this kid I know - Harry? - he once got stung by a bee? And he was allergic, and I was like 'God if you're real SAVE HIM FROM THIS BEE-STING!', and," Peter's hands go up, briefly wide-eyed, "BAM! The bee stinger fell out and he was fine. But, it turned out he wasn't allergic /anyway/, and..." Peter eyes the wall slightly to Rahne's left, /frowning/, now. "...then, I don't know. I found a bunch of letters from my dad, to my uncle. Talking about stuff like that. He's - I haven't seen him in /years/, he left a long time ago. He's this really brilliant scientist, you know? Anyway I found his letters, and read them, and he'd talk about this stuff, and how it's all not real, and I guess - I never told my uncle, because I think it'd make him /really/ sad, but - I think he's right." Peter will talk your ear off given half the chance. "But," Peter adds, and his tone gets /just/ a mite quieter: "I don't think he was really /nice/ about it. Actually I think he might have been a smug jerk to my uncle." This, Peter states just above a whisper, like he was making some manner of /confession/. "My uncle, he is like, the nicest person /ever/ oh my /god/. He seals broken glass in /boxes/ because he's worried the trashmen might /cut/ themselves otherwise." For her part, Rahne listens to everything he has to say, unconsciously fingering the little gold cross while she does so. She's not quite so fascinated by it all as just interested in hearing his view on things. Understanding him better, maybe. She sets the mug down on the floor, since there's no real reason to be holding it at the moment, and withdraws that hand into the sleeve of her sweatshirt. After a couple of moments to digest, the Scot offers her background on the matter in trade. "When I was wee, my real mum died," she says, "An' so I went to live with Reverend Craig. He wasnae a very kind man." Here, a shadow passes over her features, brief but very dark. "But he taught me about God, an' I'm grateful for that." Peter frowns. "That's - I dunno. I'm sorry. I mean, it's good that you got what you need from him, but - I just think - it's better to be /kind/, I guess? I mean, I don't really... believe, but my uncle does. And I know my dad doesn't believe... but I'd rather be with my uncle than my dad. Because I know my uncle - I don't think he's right, but I know he's /right/. He's... basically the best person I know. When I told him I was a mutant he was like - 'oh, alright then'. And that was it. He didn't even /care/. I mean, he was concerned I guess cuz he knows being a mutant is dangerous, but he just accepted it and hugged me and it wasn't even a /thing/." Then, maybe with just a hint of hesitancy, Peter asks: "When... Reverend Craig found out... what did he...?" The hint of a smile shows, and Rahne quotes, "'Let us love one anothar: for love is God; an' every one that loveth is born of God, an' knoweth God.'" It is, by the sound of it, from the Bible. "Yer uncle wilnae care whethar ye believe the same things he does or not, it sounds like." She looks away with that last question, drawing her knees up to her chest so she can wrap her arms around her legs and hold them there. She doesn't look back to him, but instead focuses down the length of the hallway, while she explains, "He wanted ta perform an exorcism. Ta drive the devil from me. Werewolves are one form demons kin take, ya ken. So... I ran away." "No, I know it wouldn't - he wouldn't be /angry/ with me," Peter says. "But I know it'd make him - sad. Worried, maybe. I don't want to worry him," Peter says, frowning at his feet. "That would be like the /worst/ thing, oh my /God/. He is not allowed to be sad." When Rahne explains what happened, Peter's eyes /pop/ open wide. And oh, how he frowns! "That's - /dude/, that's - /so/ not cool. You do not have the demons," he tells her, "I mean come /on/ even if I /did/ believe in demons you are quoting /scripture/ at me I am pretty sure that means you do not have the demons - that reverend sounds like a tool. Rahne you are not - you /know/ you do not have the demons, right?" Peter crawls forward a little. As if to /reinforce/ this point. SO hard. Maybe a little harder than Rahne requires. "The thing you do it's just /biology/. Weird biology. I do it too. My brain moves fast and I stick to walls. Sometimes you have peach-fuzz. /Oh my God/ our fencing instructor looks like /Satan/ and I swear he smells like sulphur and brimstone too but he is /super-nice/ and he is not a demon /you/ are not a demon /none/ of us have the demons I kind of want to punch your reverend guy now I'm sorry if that's not cool." Rahne rests her chin on her knees, toes curling a bit in their socks. "Aye, me mum--my adoptive mum--explained ta me," she says, after a long moment. "She's a scientist, like yer da. She taught me about how it works, so far as we undarstand it, anyway." The wee Scot peeks at Peter, then, in a sidelined study. "I dinnae ken what to think on it all, really. Jes' that God works in mysterious ways. An' He would not give anyone a burden too heavy ta bear." After a long moment, she turns the conversation in a new direction, curiosity creeping up. "What's it like? Stickin' to walls?" "Oh," Peter says, and now he backs up to the wall again - looking both relieved that Rahne /doesn't/ think she has the demons but also a little embarassed that for a moment he thought she /might/ think she had the demons. "Oh, that's cool," he tells her, in that off-handed teenage sort of way. "S'awesome. I mean, /man/, I got lucky on the whole mutant lottery thing - um, I mean," he adds with a blush, "I just mean my powers aren't hard to control. I can climb and stick to walls and I'm /crazy/ strong and I'm basically the fastest thing /ever/. Dr. McCoy tells me I might have a case of the ADHDs, though? Like my brain moves so fast it gets /starved/ for input plus it's sometimes hard for me to stay still." Oh Peter, if only you knew how Rahne debates the demon/no-demon factor even now, even when she says she knows she doesn't. But she readily gloms on to what he says about his abilities, though, and her expression even squinches a bit with amusement. "Ach, ya dinnae say," she teases him, about ADHD being a potential thing. "I ken what ya mean, though. Kinda. Sometimes, I cannae stand ta be inside, have ta go oot." And so they continue to talk about this and that, in the hallway well past curfew. Either until one of them gets too tired or an adult finds them, probably.