ArchivedLogs:Intruder Aler -- Oh, wait.

Intruder Aler -- Oh, wait.
Dramatis Personae Alison, Sophie
In Absentia	2013-06-06 Sophie manages NOT to push the panic button.
Location <XS> Gardens
From indoor gardens to outdoor, though without the protective greenhouse glass the back gardens do not last all year round. Still, the gardens out here are well-tended and well-worth spending time in, as well. The paths wending through the beds of flowers and herbs and vegetables spread out through the school's back grounds, tended by students as a credit class. Benches offer seating and a small pond is home to koi and turtles, as well as a few frogs. At the far back edges of the garden, a droning buzzing marks a few stacked white boxes as beehives. It is finals week but, happy day, Sophie has completed all of her exams and fiiiinally has some time to relax. The gardens are an especially nice place to do so; calm and tranquil, without the traffic of some of the more exciting parts of campus. In keeping with the recent, somewhat damp weather, Sophie is dressed in her usual skirt and leggings, but wears boots on her feet to guard from mud. A painfully hot-pink plaid hoodie covers her torso, unzipped to display Dark Side of the Moon t-shirt, and a pink hibiscus-print bag is sitting on the ground, next to where she is crouching. Towards the edge of the vegetable garden. She /may/ be /pilfering/... a baby carrot. Alison is one of those former students who just can't seem to stay away, even years later. She's often seen around the campus, even volunteering to help chaperone the occasional field trip. But, life and circumstances have conspired recently to keep her from her regular visits. So if she seems a bit bouncy as she comes down the garden path, it can probably be chalked up to being free of the shackles of Responsibility for a short while. Dressed in cutoff shorts and a 'Alison! World Tour 2002' t-shirt, she could be just another student, especially with her blonde hair pulled up into a ponytail. She's singing softly as she nears the vegetable garden, and she pauses, putting her hands on her hips as she watches the younger girl in her pilfering. When she speaks, it's to cheerily offer some sage advice. "Ororo will happily /give/ you a carrot, if you ask." The reply is a sharp yelp of surprise as Sophie instinctively pulls away from the garden plot, hands flying behind her back. Though she relaxes easily enough. "I was just seeing if they were big enough," she replies. It /might/ not be a lie. Who knows!! Either way, her next instinct is to frown a little, hands then moving to the pockets of her hoodie. This is-- an oddly familiar circumstance, but fortunately her earlier run-in with Lucas has resulted in her maybe not freaking out quite so easily. "I've never seen you before and I haven't heard about a new teacher... are you allowed to be here?" Alison's eyes fly open in alarm when Sophie yelps and she flutters her hands. "Oh, gosh. I didn't mean to startle you. I'm sorry!" She might be stepping forward to see if the girl is okay, only the question brings her up short, and she blinks for a moment as she tries to comprehend that Sophie doesn't recognize her. "I'm Alison Blaire," she offers slowly, her smile returning slowly. "I'm a former student, and frequent moocher of food and other things." She tips her head, studying the girl. "But I don't know that I've seen you before, either," she teases. "Are /you/ allowed to be here?" Sophie frowns a bit, biting her lower lip. She /almost/ looks convinced, but she's still wary. "I've been here all term and I don't remember seeing you here before. /I'm/ supposed to be here, though," she adds. "I don't know if.." And there she stops, thinking for a moment. HOW TO KNOW FOR SURE. "If you used to be a student here, where's the pool at?" It's... as good a method of determining truth as any. "I've been busy with work for most of this term," Alison says. "But I've been around once or twice. I chaperoned the Valentine's dance." As if this PROVES it. She still seems a bit boggled when Sophie questions her further, and she shakes her head, hands returning to her hips. "Let me see," she says. "If you're asking 'where's the pool /located/', I would tell you that it's in the basement, next to the gym. Most people get to it through the locker rooms, though, since Logan gets a little grumpy when you track water on the gym floor." She smiles a bit wider, and actually /sparkles/. "You get one more question.” There is a little bit of a smile at the image of grumpy Logan, and Sophie shakes her head a little. "Okay, no, I don't think if someone's gonna break into the school they're gonna be like, 'better know where the pool is', y'know?" She seems a /bit/ taken aback by the sparkles, but ultimately manages to take them in stride. Mutants, am I right? "I'm sorry if I was rude, it's just... some kids here got kidnapped a while ago and like a week after they got back, another student went missing and.. people are kind of on edge here, lately." Alison bobs her head. "Oh, totally. Although, it is a pretty wicked pool. If I was infiltrating the school, I would /totally/ take a dip." She grins, and raises a hand to wobble it in the air. "Which is probably why I'm not a criminal mastermind." That wobbly hand shifts to wave off Sophie's apology. "No need for that," she says. "I've heard about what's been going on around here; I would have thought it strange if you /didn't/ wonder who I was." She chuckles, and shakes her head, letting her ponytail bounce a bit. "But I'm sure that everything will be okay," she says, a tad over-bright. "Nobody stays lost for long, around here." This is delivered with all the on-air confidence of a TV personality before the older woman is regarding Sophie for a moment. "What's your name?" "Yeah, I... it probably will, but, um. It's still sort of scary, you know?" She folds one arm across her chest, rubbing the back of her head with the other arm, sort of withdrawing in on herself for a moment before relaxing again. "Like, all this stuff is happening just in time for summer break and... I just hope it doesn't make people decide not to come back next year." There's a weak little shrug, there. "Anyway, um, yeah. Sorry. My name's Sophie." She sticks out a hand. "Oh, I know," Alison says with a sympathetic smile. "I had plenty of scary moments when I was a student here. But, that's what the teachers are here for. To help you be less scared." She takes the proferred hand, wrapping delicate fingers around the girl's hand warmly. "It's nice to meet you, Sophie. And I wouldn't worry about people not coming back. There might be one or two who don't come back, but that's true of any school year, isn't it?" She squeezes Sophie's hand once, and releases her grip with a practiced smoothness. Her smile dims, just a bit, and she lowers her chin. "This is a safe place, Sophie. Everyone on these grounds is here to make sure of that." Sophie lets out a small laugh at that; amusement, more than anything else. "That's kind of funny, just yesterday one of my friends was saying he doesn't feel all that safe here anymore." Once her hand is released, she returns it to her pocket. "I mean, /that's/ not funny, but... I mean, last week there was kind of an... incident, and he got hurt, so he's probably lashing out. Um, anyway." She blushes, shaking her head a little, and rubs the back of her neck awkwardly. "I'm kind of rambling. I really do feel safe here, just... I get scared thinking of what people outside are apparently capable of. The kids who got kidnapped before... it was because they were mutants, you know?" Alison frowns. "That's too bad," she says sincerely. "This place has a lot to offer, and is safer than most of the rest of the world. But it's easy to forget that, when you're hurting." Her lips purse, then pull into a line. "It's a good thing to be wary, for us. It's a good instinct to listen to. There's always going to be people who are out to hurt us just because we're different. But it's kind of silly to go around in constant fear of the next thing that might happen." She shakes her head, and lifts her hands with a small smile. "You'll never enjoy anything, that way. The best advice I can give you is to live your life, but stay /alert/." There's a nod there. "I never, um, really used to have to think about this stuff, y'know? I didn't know I was a mutant until pretty much like... I guess late last year. Then we-- my /parents/-- decided to send me here this term. It's been really good, but uh." She scratches the back of her neck again. "Well, like I said, just. It's been scary lately. But I really am happy here. I don't especially want to leave any time soon; I feel safe even if my friend doesn't, yeah?" Sophie manages a smile there. "Plus it can't be that bad if you're coming back to visit, right?" "It's a lot to process," Alison agrees, bobbing her head. "I was in the eighth grade when my powers manifested, and it was horribly scary." She shudders theatrically, and grins. "Add to that coming to a new school, and learning about anti-mutant hysteria..." she lifts her shoulders. "And that was twenty years ago. Who could blame any of you kids for freaking out, when things have just gotten harder for us?" Then she smiles, and reaches up to tug at her ponytail, pulling the scrunchie back into place. "I love coming back here," she says. "I have so many friends who are either former students like me who now teach here, or were teachers when I was a student who I now call my friends." Dropping her hands, she offers another small sparkle. "You'll see, Sophie. This place will change your life in ways you can't even imagine." "Sounds like you were pretty much where I am now," Sophie replies with a little laugh. "We've been getting a lot of new students in lately, which is nice. New friends, yeah?" She smiles. "For now I'm just sort of taking things one day at a time. It really isn't /that/ much different from regular school, just the whole... living at school thing. It's weird but it's cool, right? And I do sorta feel safer staying here than I do leaving. Lots of kids just kinda... hang out in the city during the weekend or whatever, but lately I just don't even get it, it's /terrifying/. But I guess they're used to it." "I think it's pretty much the same for most mutant kids, when they figure it out," Alison says, moving to claim a spot on a handy nearby bench. "All of a sudden, you're DIFFERENT, on top of all the awkward teenager junk. It's the worst." She leans back in the bench, stretching her arms along the back. "You'll get used to it," she says of boarding school. "Just think of it like Hogwarts, but for mutants. And without a Snape. Unless you count Logan -- he can be pretty grumpy." She laughs, then, and shakes her head. "Most of the kids who go to the city are from there," she notes. "They feel fairly safe there because it's familiar. But it /is/ scary," she agrees. "I'm from Long Island, and the city scared /me/ for a good two years." She grins. "If you want to go in, sometime, I'm sure that the Professor would let me serve as chaperone." Sophie sort of ambles over towards the bench, flopping down herself and folding her hands in her lap. "Mr. Logan isn't /so/ bad," she replies with a grin, but tone suggests she can tell it was a joke. "Every so often some of us talk about going into town here and just getting like pizza and stuff. I did go to the city once, it's.. I mean, it's cool, but there's nothing there I really /need/, you know?" She hms, thoughtfully. "Though there is this really cool bakery we went to, I don't remember /where/ it was but it's called, um, Happy Cakes Bakery? It was super good. You know there's a couple kids here who don't know what /Slurpees/ are?" "Oh, Logan is great," Alison says with a bob of her ponytail. "He actually helped me find my current bodyguard. So yeah. He's not so bad." One leg is drawn up, then, so that Alison can loop her arms around her knee. "Oh, Westchester is fun," she says with a bright (bright!) smile. "I've spent way too many weekends just down there. People aren't /keen/ on mutants, there, but they're not as openly hostile as they can be in New York." She tips her head, and frowns. "Happy Cakes Bakery?" she echoes. "I don't know it, but I'll definitely remember to check it out. I love good cake." She laughs at Sophie's sort of stream-of-consciousness ramble, and tips her head back to stare at the sky, briefly. "There's plenty of countries in the world that have mutants and don't have Slurpees," she says. "Although I insist that be corrected at the first opportunity. That's criminal, letting that go on much longer." Grinning at that, Sophie gives a little nod. "Well, right. I mean, he /is/ from out of the country so I can kind of understand it, but... yeah, we're gonna take a trip to the city as soon as we can. People might not want to so much with Ivan missing, but if a bunch of us go.." She gives a little shrug, there. "Should be okay? I think.. it'd be nice if people could see that we aren't gonna be jerks. People who don't like mutants, I mean. I mean most of us can kind of... pass for human, I guess is the best way to put it. That's how Mr. Wagner put it. I do have one friend who has wings, though, but... I mean, shouldn't people be able to realize that we aren't all bad? I just.. I just really don't get it. Why people have to be like that." Alison frowns a bit, and lifts her head to stare at the distant pond. "Ivan is so sweet," she says a bit sadly. "I hope he's all right." Her mouth tugs downward a bit, and then she's shaking herself. "Well, maybe we don't have to go into the city," she allows. "I think there's a 7-11 in Salem Center, and they'll have Slurpees. I think that would be safe enough." She grins, and reaches out to poke the girl in the shoulder. "Besides, we'd have my guy Mel with us, and /no one/ wants to mess with him." She holds up her hands, sketching a very large person in the air. She smiles a bit at Sophie's wish and confusion, and lifts a shoulder. "It's going to sound trite, but they're like that because they're scared. And they're scared because mutation is a new and visibly different thing that isn't very well known. People tend to be unreasonably terrified of things they don't understand very well." She holds up a finger, and adopts a very Professor-like expression. "It is up to us to learn to control our powers and help to educate them on the importance of peaceful co-existence." Alison /might/ be quoting. A little bit. "That sounds like something the professor would say," Sophie replies. Not accusatorily, just.. observing. For all she knows, Alison came up with it herself. "Dr. McCoy was kinda telling me something like that too, the other day. But it's... sometimes it's easier to just sorta be mad that people are jerks." She forces a faint sort of smile there. "Which I guess sounds terrible, but... I dunno." She lets out a little sigh, leaning back a bit, hands thrust back into her hoodie pockets, head tilted back for a minute. "...wait, you have a bodyguard?" She may have failed to make the celebrity connection. "It's paraphrased," Alison admits with a sheepish grin. "And you'll hear it often, around here. It's good advice. People may not like us, but with work they can learn that we're not /all/ powder kegs waiting to go off." She giggles at Sophie's easier solution, and shakes her head. "You're a teenager," she says. "So, yeah. Sometimes it /is/ easier to feel that way." She flashes a million-watt smile when Sophie skips back a track, and tosses her ponytail. "I actually do," she says. "It's sort of a requirement in my contract with my producers. He doesn't come on the school grounds very often, but he goes pretty much everywhere else I go." She flutters fingers in the air. "He's an absolute treasure, too. He's super-strong, and huge, and he can type faster than anyone I've ever seen." "Ohhh jeez," Sophie blushes, leaning forward to briefly bury her face in her hands. "I didn't even-- I don't really watch TV very much and I didn't recognize you," she admits, finally lifting her head again. "I probably sounded like a total dork, jeez, I'm sorry." Shaking her head a few times, she just looks altogether entirely embarassed by the situation. "I'm like, sitting here wondering why you're talking about bodyguards and-- I did think you looked familiar. Jeez." Alison laughs, sparkles popping in small multi-colored bubbles around her as she enjoys Sophie's embarrassment a bit. "Do /not/ worry about it. My show's on smack in the middle of the day. You'd be in classes, anyway. And it's actually kind of nice /not/ to be recognized, once in a while. Especially around here. This is kind of my haven from all of that, you know?" She giggles a bit more, and shakes her head. "Not that I mind being recognized all /that/ much. Everyone is usually pretty sweet about it." She smiles, and lifts her eyebrows. "Where are you from?" she asks, reaching up to fluff at her ponytail absently. "Before you came to the school." Sophie gestures vaguely in what she assumes to be a west-ish direction. "Over by Lake Erie, a little city called Fredonia. We have a university and a catfood factory and that's pretty much it. I dunno if there's any mutants other'n me who live there, it's pretty small. Though with the college there there's probably some students..." She hmms thoughtfully; that thought actually hadn't occurred to her before. "...but uh, yeah. Little city, about an hour from Buffalo. Which is nowhere /near/ as big as New York City is. It's very uh.. small town kind of thinking, like Salem Center." "You'd be surprised at how many people are mutants and don't realize it. They're just the /tiniest/ bit faster, or smarter, or what have you, and they don't consider it a mutant ability." Alison lifts a shoulder. "It's only when you get to our end of the spectrum that people start to wig out." The older woman grins, and sits forward, then, resting her elbows on her knees. "If it's like Salem Center, then maybe going into town will make you feel better," she suggests helpfully. "Give you a taste of home, and help you get balanced." Then she grimaces, and wrinkles her nose. "Although, I don't know if Fredonia has a coffee place as amazing as The Grindstone." Grinning, Sophie shakes her head a little. "Well, the school has a Starbucks that's open to the public..." But, she realizes just how terribly gauche that sounds, and continues, "There's a couple places in town but I'm not really a coffee person. Gimme a Slurpee and a pizza and I'm good. Just, y'know, not from the same place." Ugh, gas station pizza. "I actually didn't even know I was a mutant for a while, my parents found out before I did. My power like... when I use it, I sort of -- I'm not really /asleep/, it's kind of like meditating? But it happens sometimes when I /am/ asleep and it was happening for a while before they told me. I think they were hoping it'd go away or they were crazy." Alison grins. "Oh, there's nothing wrong with not liking coffee," she says with a giggle. "It's not for everyone. But the Grindstone has /amazing/ hot chocolate. Really nice, in the winter." She sits up as Sophie explains her manifestation, and shakes her head. "So, you have some sort of dream power?" she guesses, her face lighting up. "That's really neat!" Then there's a small roll of her eyes. "/My/ mutant power kicked in during a talent show, in front of the whole school," she says. "And for like a week, I couldn't shut it off. I hid in my house for the entire time." She smiles wanly. "My poor father didn't know what to do about it, until the Professor came along." "Oh, I /do/ like hot chocolate," Sophie muses. "I'll keep that in mind when fall rolls around." But as far as her power goes, she gives a light shake of her head. "It's more like... we're not really sure exactly what it is because it's a little weird? But what I do is sort of like... I can kind of make a ghost hologram of myself. I'm starting to think it's a psychic kind of thing, 'cause it isn't /solid/ but if I concentrate I can move things. I might be able to do it while I'm awake, eventually, but for now it's like... like trying to watch two movies on different sides of the room at the same time." Alison nods. "You should try and schedule an appointment with the Professor, or Ms. Grey," she suggests with a smile. "If it /is/ a psychic ability, they're the best ones to try and help you hone it. But it doesn't sound like anything I've heard of." She scrunches her nose. "Not that I'm an expert or anything." Then she's standing, and nodding at the mansion. "Speaking of hot chocolate, I'm getting a little cool in these shorts. What say we go and raid the kitchen for some snacks, and you can fill me in on all the not-scary gossip that's going around the campus." She smiles. "I need to know what cliffhangers the semester is ending on."