Hank McCoy (notabozo) wrote in colligo_threads, @ 2012-12-30 14:17:00 |
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Entry tags: | hank mccoy, rachel summers |
WHO: Hank McCoy and Rachel Summers
WHAT: Rachel has offered to help Hank with his temporary telepathy
WHEN: Backdated to Sunday, November 18th. Evening
WHERE: The Xavier Mansion; The Quiet Room
RATING: G
STATUS: Complete
The last couple of hours had quite possibly been the worst Hank had, had to endure in quite sometime. He hadn’t thought that everyone would get so angry at him for expressing his opinion on his own personal mutation. He had no intention of trying to make anyone else feel bad and had absolutely no problems with anyone else’s mutations, which everyone should have known. While he could see why what he’d said had upset Raven, he hadn’t thought she’d get so upset as to break off what they had only recently figured out and that only reminded him once again about how it had felt to watch her leave on the beach that day back home. Hank thought Raven was beautiful no matter what form she took, whether it was blond, brunette or blue and the only reason he’d been so adamant about trying to get her to take the serum with him was because he’d only wanted them all to fit in, but since arriving in Colligo, he’d come to realize that it was a far more accepting place and time than the one he grew up in. That didn’t mean, however, that he was ready to fully accept his own mutation. He was no longer trying to change himself and he was doing the best he could, with the help of his friends, to accept himself However, tonight’s response to an opinion that should have been erased wasn’t helping in the least.
Maybe Stephanie was right and Raven did deserve better than him, but that didn’t change the fact that he cared about Raven more than anyone else. He hadn’t gone out of his way to try and hurt Raven and didn’t know whether it was solely because of what he’d said about telepathy or if it had anything to do with her not having her mutation at the moment that had caused her to become as upset as she was, but he could only hope that if he gave her a little time, she’d listen to him and he’d be able to apologize correctly.
For the time being, he was on his way to meet Rachel in the Quiet Room in an attempt to figure out how to control his telepathy. Maybe if he could control this then that would help in his quest to accept his own mutation.
While Rachel didn’t regret offering to help Hank or speaking up in his defense, she regretted that she’d stayed involved in the debate for as long as she had. She clearly wasn’t going to change anyone’s mind-- and even if she currently had her telepathy, she wouldn’t literally do that to them. It was painful, though, seeing so many people jumping to criticize Hank and nobody else seeming to have put some thought into why Hank might have those feelings. Maybe Kitty and Dr. Banner had in their talks with him, but she didn’t know since she hadn’t had a chance to get their side.
She didn’t know if she was right about Hank’s possible perspective on things. Even if she was, she thought it was better that someone try to counter the attacks than to keep it to herself just in case they got it wrong.
Talking (or typing) things out had never exactly been one of her conflict resolution strengths. Her telepathy, absolutely. Brute force of power with telekinesis when it was the physical kind of conflict? Yep. But words just didn’t seem to work out all that well for her, especially when it came to Raven Xavier. Rachel had lost track of just how many times Raven had snapped at her. She hardly ever initiated any conversation with Raven because it just might go wrong yet again. Although she’d changed in her memories and life experience since her early Colligo days, she still wanted to avoid conflicts with her housemates when she could.
So, that brought her to the Quiet Room. Hank’s newfound temporary telepathy could become overwhelming, and with so much heightened emotion, he could very well accidentally do serious harm to the minds around him. Upsetting an untrained or unfocused telepath was very dangerous. Thank goodness Erik had built that Quiet Room. She was sure that if she hadn’t spoken up to help, Charles would have. She waited outside the door.
Hank wasn’t so sure that Charles would have stepped in to help; at least not after what had happened with Raven. Hank knew that Charles was extremely protective of Raven and if Hank hurt her, then chances were, he was going to side with Raven until things were worked out. While this was not his ideal way to start off his time as a telepath, Hank was glad that Rachel had offered to help him. While Hank still didn’t really know Rachel well, he saw this as an opportunity to do just that. Even after being in Colligo for a couple of months, he still didn’t have very many friends outside of Raven, Charles and Erik, but he certainly was grateful for the few that he did have and hoped that he would be able to call Rachel his friend soon instead of simply a housemate.
Reaching the Quiet Room, Hank adjusted his glasses as he stopped near where Rachel was standing and frowned slightly as her thoughts invaded his mind despite the fact that he tried to block it out. “I apologize, but I can’t help but hear your thoughts at the moment. I just thought you should know.” Hank had spent the last couple of hours in his lab where he hadn’t been able to hear the thoughts of the others in the Mansion, so the sudden onslaught of thoughts was unsettling; just as it had been when he’d woken up and found that he could hear the thoughts of those on the second floor as he had passed their bedrooms on his way downstairs. “Should we get started?” Hank gestured towards the door of the Quiet Room, anxious to get this sorted out.
“It’s all right,” she said. “Yes, let’s get right to it.”
Rachel smiled kindly to him and entered the Quiet Room. Hank was in many ways unlike the “Uncle Henry” she’d grown up with, but the politeness was very much like his older (and bluer) counterpart. She knew Hank wouldn’t be able to help picking up on that thought about him; it’d be hypocritical of her if that bothered her. When her own telepathy had developed, she’d had the benefit of her mom’s example and the Professor’s to learn how to block other people’s thoughts. They couldn’t stop the constant “background noise,” of course, but it was much better than knowing every single thing people thought all the time.
And of anyone here, Hank would be understanding of her mixed feelings about him seeing her unmasked marks. She didn’t mind them showing when she was in her Phoenix mode, but she still got self-conscious about being ordinary Rachel with lines radiating over her face.
“So, a crash course in psi-screening, and anything else you might want to cover.” She went to the center of the room and sat cross-legged. “Right now, you’ll probably be ‘hearing’ my thoughts about what I’ll say before I can actually speak-- but would you rather I talk out loud anyway?” He was obviously more used to verbal communication, though it’d take longer to get across the ideas that way.
Hank couldn’t help but quirk a brow slightly as he picked up on her thought about his future self and had he not been having such a bad morning, he might have smiled, “You know me when I’m older?” It had never actually occurred to Hank before that since Rachel was from the future, she might know him and other versions of his friends in her time, so actually hearing what she thought about his future self was interesting. He was tempted to ask her what he was like in the future, because the time he had changed into his future self, he had been so interested in Tesla and the other vampires in town that he didn’t really remember much about the experience besides how he’d felt about his mutation at that time. Now that he possessed the memories of his incident with the serum, he wondered how long it had taken for him to become comfortable enough in his blue furred form to actually go out in public. But this was not the time to ask her about the future. There would be plenty of time for that later. Now, he had to get this telepathy under control.
Following Rachel into the room, Hank stood across from her, awkwardly, arms folded over his chest, “I’d prefer if you spoke, if you wouldn’t mind.” While he knew that they’d have to use non-verbal communication eventually, he felt more at east if they used words; at least in the beginning.
“I knew the Dr. Henry McCoy of my timeline,” Rachel said, somewhat correcting the point. In her time in Colligo, she’d grown more used to making clear distinctions between people she’d known and people who were here-- other than Kitty, of course. Almost everyone else had been so different, whether in life experience or personality. Raven, in particular, was so very unlike the Raven Darkholme of other universes. Charles and Raven had both called out Rachel on how judgemental she’d been back then. Time here had helped change that, and her more recent time in Excalibur gave her much more extensive experience meeting multiple versions of one person. Hank had the genius and manners of the older Henry(s); he lacked or hadn’t yet developed Henry’s confidence and boisterousness.
With the door to the Quiet Room closed, Hank should have great relief from the onslaught of anyone’s thoughts except her own. She was used to using her telepathy to shield her thoughts from other telepaths, but she could still do some screening without it to keep Hank’s uncontrolled telepathy from getting overwhelmed. She nodded to him and gestured towards the floor.
“Please, have a seat. It’ll help.” Part of that was because with his unfamiliar feet, he might well lose his balance while they did this work. The other was just basic meditative posture. “Do you know if you’ve been projecting your thoughts?”
Hank followed Rachel’s lead and took a seat on the floor and attempted to get as comfortable as could be while he listened to Rachel’s words as well as her thoughts, which was an interesting experience for sure. “I’m not sure. I’ve been in my lab almost since the moment I realized what was going on. It’s far enough away from everyone else, that I’ve been able to get some quiet.” Now he wished that he’d left his PDA up in his room like he usually did, because then he wouldn’t have completely screwed things up with Raven and practically everyone else in the Mansion, “How would I know if I had?” While Hank had done research on telepathy in the past, as well as other mutations, reading about it and seeing Charles use his was completely different than actually possessing the ability and using it yourself.
“The lab was far enough? Hmm... That might give us a sense of your range. Do you think of the lab as a quiet place in general?” She settled herself more as Hank sat down as well. “You’d... know.” It wasn’t easy to explain in words things that she took for granted. “Oh, you’d probably ‘hear’ people reacting to your thoughts, or complaining about it.”
“From what I’ve deduced, my telepathy only works when I’m in the general vicinity of another person. When I first realized it, I was in my bedroom and when I went out onto the landing, I could hear the thoughts of anyone who was also on the landing or had their doors open near my room. When I went downstairs, I couldn’t hear their thoughts anymore, but if there was anyone on the first landing near the staircase, I could read theirs.” Hank didn’t know exactly how his telepathy worked, but what he did know was that it was different than Charles’ and when he was around someone he couldn’t turn it off. “As in, communicating with someone else telepathically and I’d be able to hear their responses the same way I can hear their thoughts.” Even when extremely confused, Hank was still an exceptionally quick learner.
“Hmmm... when their doors were open, did you have to be able to see them-- line of sight? Or was it just the doors being open, like having walls around was blocking it? Maybe earshot?” Rachel was sure that Hank would’ve observed those sorts of details, instinctively noting the variables. He’d surely noticed that Charles’ and Rachel’s telepathy didn’t have the same limited range. Of course he’d pick up quickly on what she said, and she smiles at that. “Right.”
“If their doors were open I was able to hear what they were thinking as I got closer,” The first time it had happened, Hank had almost thought that Damian was talking to him, but he’d quickly realized that the other teenager hadn’t been talking to him, but had been thinking about the robbery he’d stopped the night before. “I believe I have to be in earshot, because until I actually saw you in the hall, I couldn’t read your thoughts.” Hank knew that if he wanted to test his telepathy more he’d have to go upstairs and be in the vicinity of his other housemates, but at the moment, he didn’t think any of them wanted him around and if what they’d written in response to his post was any indication, he was pretty sure he already knew what they were thinking.
“Maybe we can encourage everyone to keep their doors closed until this is over?” After all the arguing, even those who weren’t involved in it were likely to be thinking of it. Hank really didn’t need to be exposed to those thoughts. Hopefully, it wouldn’t take much for him to block those out. “Anyway, I was asking about the lab as a quiet place because it’s helpful to have a visual when you’re learning this. Some people go with the standard brick walls. I think that doesn’t really do enough. I want you to picture somewhere that you feel like nobody and nothing can reach you unless you let them come over, where it’s peaceful. Quiet.”
“Seems easy enough,” Hank was pretty sure that, that was something that he would be able to do fairly easy and was glad that Rachel had offered to help him. Without another word, he closed his eyes and pictured his lab, focusing on the familiarity of the room instead of on Rachel’s thoughts in his head. It took a few moments, but Hank succeeded in blocking out the thoughts. At least for a few minutes. “That worked. It was only a few moments, but it worked.” Hank couldn’t help but allow a small smile to spread across his lips. Hank knew that there was more to his new ability than simply telepathy, but he needed to get the telepathy under control first before he began to figure out the rest of it and it appeared that he was on the right track to doing so.
Rachel smiled a little as well, pleased that he picked up on the technique so quickly. If he kept it up, he’d get a lot of relief without having to physically isolate himself. “Try putting more detail into it. Really build it up. The more you’re there, the less you’ll have other thoughts sneaking in. And if it’s too much, you can always come back here. I’ll help as much as you want.”
Once again, Hank was grateful to Rachel for offering her help and realized that he should have simply asked for help in the beginning instead of trying to work this out on his own. Had he learned nothing from the incident with the other scientists during the Fear Toxin outbreak? He really needed to start reaching out to others first instead of isolating himself and waiting for an opportunity to arise for him to speak up. Perhaps if he began doing that, he could prevent incidents like this afternoon from even occurring in the future.