misconcieved : Pete McCoy (misconception) wrote in gen_m_logs, @ 2008-07-01 22:40:00 |
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Entry tags: | pete mccoy, phil mccoy |
log: the McCoy Boys
WHO: Phil and Pete
WHEN: waaaaaaaay back when everyone got home from Mojo II: Electric Boogaloo
WHERE: in the medlabs
WHAT: nothing to see here, folks! move along. just a little growing pains!
When the nanotech control was lost, Pete didn't say a word. Shellshocked, he didn't say a thing or act and had to be led back into jet. Everything felt raw and wrong and later, he wouldn't be able to recall a single thing about the ride home. His face was slack and stunned the whole time. Upon arriving home, he leaves the medical laboratory as Dr. McCoy tends to the other wounded and walks numbly down the hall. But he's not that numb at all.
He can remember every minute, every moment and while he knows what caused it, there's still something wrong. Punching Jack, everything Rosie told him, following the others and even putting Phil to sleep, these most alien reactions he has ever experienced in his short eleven years of consciousness... actually made a modicum of sense. Something had to be wrong with him.
He walked to the downstairs labs and went to his computer. With a couple clicks and keystrokes, the school interanet and journal systems were reapproved. Pete walked calmly to the Hulk Panic Room and closed the door behind him, hearing the pneumatic hiss of the locks seal him in.
At least everyone else would be safe now. Did Hank McCoy's experiment go wrong? Was he truly ruined? Pete held on to his head and felt his eyes hurt, his breath coming a little shallowly.
When Phil was done with helping his father with the other students, the first thing he did was look for Pete. Of course! He didn't find him at his computer, but ah, he saw that the network was back up. So he can't be far.... Phil looks around the room, like they're playing hide and seek, "Pete? Peeeet--" Oh. Is Pete in the Hulk's Hamster Cage?
You can see him in the little window, knees pulled into his chest, eyes a little distant and... crying. This should go in the baby book, as Pete finds himself crying as the result of an emotional reaction for the first time. He's terrified and confused and as much as he wants to respond to Phil, he can't bring himself to do it. He remembers the way Phil slumped unconscious because Pete had made him that way and feels a little sick.
Whoa. Phil stands there and watches Pete. He knows how to get inside the Hulk Room. But .. Pete's crying? This is weird to him. After a few moments pass of just watching, Phil remembers that Pete is probably well aware he's watching. With a whoosh, the door opens. Phil enters and closes it behind him. Oh shoot. Pretend you did that on purpose. "Hey, Pete."
Pete doesn't look up, his arms hanging at his sides like a broken doll. His throat feels tight, coughing a little before he answers, his voice sounding strange and odd to him. He really is losing it and the more upset he gets, the more alien he feels in his own skin. "...you shouldn't be in here," he tells Phil quietly, fearfully. Has Pete ever really been afraid of anything? At least, when Phil isn't?
"I know, it's creepy. You think that Samson would at least put a kitten poster in here or something." Phil sits on the floor next to Pete. Within strangling range, even. He sits with his knees to his chest and links his fingers together.
He swallows hard with a tiny sniff. Pete feels like he's falling apart. "... I don't... I ..." A small cough. "I don't want to hurt you," he explains in a tiny voice. He doesn't know a word bigger than 'sorry'.
Phil unlinks his fingers and goes to put his arm around Pete, to squeeze him close to his side. "You won't." Phil wants to prove he's not afraid of Pete. He knows Pete didn't do it on purpose! The whole time, he knew this wasn't right. That it wasn't Pete.
Pete leans into Phil, grateful for the simple touch but unable to articulate why. "There's something wrong with me. My eyes hurt, I can't breathe, there's a ... tight feeling in my chest," Pete tries to explain but remains entirely overwhelmed by the experience. He's never looked so human.
"Yeah, I know." Phil takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out. He continues to breath slowly like that, "Breathe like me. Keep crying if you feel like you got some more in ya. It's all right. Just me, you, and the Hulk Room." Until someone comes along to let them out. Hopefully it's their Pop. "You'll feel better afterwards. Probably need to blow your nose." If Pete is anything like Phil (which he is), he'll need to blow his nose pretty hardcore after this is over. Phil squeezes Pete's shoulder, then reaches up to gingerly pat the side of his head. "There... there." Sounds a little out of place, but sincere.
Pete is fantastic at taking instruction. It takes him a bit, the way people wobble when riding a bike before catching their balance, but he matches his breathing with Phil, sniffling a bit more. It feels better, but there are still no answers. He feels terrible. "I shouldn't have wanted to do any of that," he admits between the two of them.
"It wasn't you, it was the nanovirus. You don't still want to do it." ... Right? Phil is calm and careful with his words. Usually he just doesn't give a hoot, but this is Pete. Poor Pete who's never had to deal with being angry or crying before. Poor Pete who can't benefit from some nice, calming pheromones. Pete, his brother and his clone. He's worried about Pete for so long, worried he can't be emotional. Now he is, and Phil wishes Pete didn't have to deal with it. Must have been nice.
Be careful what one wishes for as growing pains are never pleasant. He's relaxing a bit more, but Pete still smells like fear. Worse, he smells a little like Phil's fear. Very disconcerting. "It was me. I wanted to hit Jack," he admits shamefully. "I wanted to do all those things. I didn't think of anything else."
Phil fights the urge to say that wanting to hit Jack is normal. "It seems to me that the ... it didn't make you do stuff, it just ... it took away your inhibitions." Wait a second, Pete wanted to make Phil pass out from a lack of oxygen? "You weren't in control, it was getting deep in your brainmeats." That's a scientific term. "It's over now, everything is all right. No one is hurt seriously. Jack got healed up by Duckie. Wes too." Who else did Pete hurt? Phil considers this, also considers that maybe his memory is going. Did Pete give him brain damage? Oh crap.
"I never want to do that again. It... I feel ill," Pete states, trying to get back to a more rational state, reasoning through a perfectly normal emotional reaction. It's a little like driving a car with the parking brake on.
"And so you wont." That was easy! "It's over, you're not doing it again. The end." Phil announces The End like he just finished reading a children's story to Pete.
Pete looks at Phil with slightly desperate and slightly red eyes. "How do you know?," he asks, not accusingly, but with some amount of wonder. How could Phil be so sure?
"I just know. I know you. I trust you. I didn't even think that you were acting on your own accord originally." Phil was certain that something was wrong with Pete one way or another. Even if he did tell Pete to punch Jack, Pete would probably consider it for awhile before eventually... doing it. "You're a good person."
Pete looks down, taking this all in as he did anything else in his life, gravely serious. "I don't feel like a good person," Pete says quietly and sniffles.
"Well, I'm telling you you're a good person." He almost said Would I Lie To You. No, Phil, don't use that. "You'll feel better eventually. It's all right to feel bad. --IN fact?" Oh, Phil's on to something, "Because you feel bad, that makes you a good person." So there.
"I'm not sure I understand," answers Pete. the back of his hand comes up to rub at his face, a little startled by how wet it is. There was no reason for his tear ducts to do that, no viable need to wash his eyes of irritants. He felt oddly tired, but hadn't really done anything.
"If you didn't regret it, if you didn't care, that would make you either heartless or just some animal. But you do care! You feel bad about it. I'm serious, what kind of person could stomp on another man's hand and just say--" Phil holds his hand out, wobbles it, "Ehhh, oh well." His other hand squeezes Pete's shoulder towards him again. "Do you get it now?" Patience, something he usually doesn't have for most people.
Pete processes this information. Nodding his head slightly, he did get it to some extent, he just didn't feel any better about it. Hearing Phil bring up Jack hand made him wince slightly; the man had been wary of Pete before, now he'd probably never trust him again. To be honest, Pete isn't sure he could trust himself. But Phil did, and that's what counted most. "Yeah," he answers quietly.
"I know you're a good person. You do what's right, you take care of others before yourself. I'd put my life in your hands. You're my best friend, you're my brother, and I love you very much." Phil tilts his head, resting it on Pete. "So. Yeah." There. Chew on that.
He does. Pete's head rests against Phil's and he's finally able to take a better breath than he had been. "....Thanks."
"You're welcome." Phil doesn't have anything to say other than that. Now that they're done talking, their father will come along and let them out of the Hulk Room. Maybe this will convince him not to leave, as they are apparently helpless without him.