RICHIE IS NOT GAY. (mimicries) wrote in invol_rpg, @ 2012-08-13 09:26:00 |
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SAM: After a short speech by Wolfe over the importance of learning to understand and work with one’s teammates and a reminder of who was paired with who, the Rooster duos were all sent off to different parts of the warehouse to begin their training. Their first order of business was just to discuss their abilities, limitations, and possible ways of working together. As the more amiable Roosters - lets be real, most everyone else - set about to chatting and laughing, Sam cast a reluctant gaze towards the sullen Canadian. Sam had made his feelings about Richie’s contrariness pretty clear, but ultimately the lack of team assignments since that first day had meant he hadn’t yet had to directly address the issue. It seemed that this was about to change, as Sam drew in a breath and walked over to his partner, trying to inject as much friendliness into his smile as he could, “Guess that’s you and me, then.” RICHIE: There wasn’t much more that Wolfe could possibly do to put an end to Richie’s reluctant participation -- if being present was enough to be called that. Forcing direct interaction was basically forcing Richie to do more, and he was rather put-out by the whole arrangement. This had manifested itself in the perpetual knit of his eyebrows and the icy wall of ‘Don’t-talk-to-me’ that was his body language: arms crossed, turned away from the rest of his team, feet set in a neutral stance that deflected any interaction. But it was clear that Sam -- that American kid who seemed to think this was like some scene in the inspirational military movie of his life -- had taken the mantle of leader upon his shoulders, and in some unfortunate twist of fate (or Wolfe thinking very purposely about these pairs), the team’s veritable star student was forced to work with the kid that would rather be in his room. Or anywhere but here, for that matter. “Guess so,” Richie replied. It was said without disdain but also without enthusiasm, and he didn’t really move from his position in the corner, leaning against the wall with the disaffected air of someone who figured himself to be way above this teamwork bullshit. He was chewing on a piece of paper, and it served the same purpose as a cigarette as far as appearances went. Richie threw it out of his mouth and crushed it into the ground with his toe, a habit. He should have offered more to Sam, but it was clear that he wasn’t intending on making this exercise easy or even beneficial for either of them. Doing something good for the IVF? He would rather stick a gun in his mouth at this point, though it seemed like a more attractive thing each day with the vapidness of the entire student body and the absurdly transparent, in his humble opinion, shenanigans of what was a military academy, albeit one full of superpowered humans. That was what made it really sinister. He looked at Sam with expectation, as if to say, ‘Lead the way’ -- the question was, would he follow? SAM: A good portion of Sam’s forced cheerfulness deflated visibly in the face of Richie’s aggressive irreverence, those broad shoulders slumping ever so slightly. He made an effort not to let his annoyance show through, though he was hardly a pro when it came to effortlessly masking emotions. “Right, so...” he began after a heavy silence, his hands coming together in a decisive clap. “You’re a mimic then, right? I know there’s a few people around who can do things with other people’s powers, and way I’ve heard it you’re all a little bit different. Want to walk me through the ins and outs of your deal?” His tone fell something just shy of peppy, with the underlying tension that suggested he was only trying ‘affable’ as a first strategy, and it was ready to fall away if Richie didn’t feel like playing nice. RICHIE: Richie wasn’t meeting Sam’s gaze -- not out of intimidation or anything, but with the way he was acting, it was out of plain disrespect. He didn’t want to look at him: too inconsequential in what Richie had decided matter, of which he could count on one hand when it came to being here at IVI. He didn’t understand why Sam was so into training when Richie had already figured out that any progress would be in favor of IVF for their undoubtedly nefarious plans, but he figured it had do more with a failed attempt at a ‘being the hero’ dream than plain ignorance. Unless he really was an idiot. Which was, of course, entirely possible: after all, Richie didn’t talk to most of the people on his team, and when he did, it wasn’t memorable. “If you use your power on me, I can use it back.” Richie’s tone was flat, bored, even, and he was looking directly through Sam, as if he was more interested in observing the things behind him than the actual person talking to him. Which was his intention, of course. At this point, Richie could have elaborated, but he wasn’t going to: he was going to be an ass today, because annoying Sam was more entertaining to him than playing good little soldier for everyone here. “There’s nothing to walk anyone through.” SAM: The hackles on Sam’s neck were practically visible, the tiny twitch of muscle beneath his ear that indicated a tightening of his jaw. He did not take well to this overt disrespect, and his tone was becoming increasingly strained as his patience thinned. “Well,” he continued pointedly, “I’m a metallokinetic. I figure you may not know, since you don’t seem to pay much attention. It means I can move things with my mind. Things like your watch.” Here Sam lifted one hand, pointer finger extended, and wiggled it back and forth at Richie’s wrist. The timepiece thereupon jerked back and forth of it’s own volition, giving him the impression of having a spasming arm. “Or your belt buckle.” Again a quick swipe of his finger, and Richie found his hips swiveling sideways, as if to a jaunty latin beat. Sam’s brow was raised in challenge, as if to say that he was ready to return the same amount of respect he was shown, if that’s how things were going to be played. RICHIE: There was a moment when Richie’s impassive veneer cracked a bit to reveal his irritation, which settled itself in the downturn of his mouth, the deeper furrowing of his brow -- but he neatly slipped it back again, as if the somewhat-embarrassing manipulation of his motor skills, although secondhand, had not been entirely effective in collapsing his carefully-constructed cool. However, slipping into Sam’s power -- although unfamiliar -- was not terrible, and Richie felt the recognizable ‘twinge’ in his brain that indicated success. As soon as that happened, Richie concentrated and lifted his hand -- his whole hand, because one of his disadvantages was that he needed to put more effort into these sort of things, and a finger wouldn’t cut it. “So belt buckles,” Richie repeated, feigning a sincere want to participate and understand as he forced Sam’s own to pull him forward hard, making the other young man stumble forward. “And zippers too, right?” he continued, and up went Sam’s jacket zipper all the way to his chin, tugging up hard so that it was practically pulling the garment up as if there were an invisible fist. But he could only exert so much energy -- Richie held the force for a few more seconds before he released it, feeling like he had been holding his breath for far too long. His temples twitched with the inevitable oncoming aches of using an unfamiliar power, but he could deal with that. Right now, he wanted to put Mr. Perfect Soldier in his place. SAM: Sam began to smile at Richie’s feigned sincerity, believe for a half a moment that he was making headway before his own belt jerked him forward sharply at the hips. He exhaled sharply from the pull, and before he’d quite caught his balance he found himself lifted to his toes from the force of his zipper’s upward momentum. “Heh,” Sam chuckled, albeit a little breathlessly from the sudden tugging to and fro. A quick roll of his hand and his zipper and belt adjusted themselves comfortably, “Good.You catch on quick, didn’t expect that.” Despite the wry clip to his backhanded insult Sam’s smile was sincere; for all the insolence of Richie’s display of power, the American was earnestly pleased to see they were making headway. “You always take to people’s powers that well?” RICHIE: There was a definite pause there and immediately Richie’s cautious nature began to practically blare at him in his head, ‘Be careful where you tread!’ He took a moment to evaluate the position of Wolfe -- a good distance away, working with another pair -- and seeing no one else hovering close to the pair, his eyes sliding across the warehouse and taking careful stock of everyone’s position. Once he felt comfortable making sure no one was hovering around their general vicinity, Richie cleared his throat and began to talk. “The closer the other person is, the easier it is, and immediate use is better than waiting,” he supplied, business-like. He wasn’t about to mention just how much effort that had taken -- that using an unfamiliar power was sort of like lifting a huge weight without a spotter, or like wandering through a maze without a clear idea of where the exit was besides that it was nowhere in sight. He knew he was going to have a headache from this training session if he kept up the farce of absolute ease with Sam, but it was better to have him think he was stronger than he was and not know his weaknesses -- Richie wasn’t keen on revealing those. “It takes a moment to switch between powers, but not too long.” Of course, a ‘moment’ could be up to more than an hour, depending, but Richie wasn’t going to say that either. SAM: Sam listened to all of this intently, nodding at each point, his brain clearly logging away each tidbit and assessing it for its strategic relevance. Both the forced cordiality and the confrontational tension had disappeared from his demeanor, and now he was just interested in the assignment. “That’s amazing.” He answered seriously, “I mean, you can do anything any one of us can. Having a power is pretty crazy, but having any power?” Sam cocked his head curiously, and buried just beneath his question, rooted in his tone, was the heavy subtext: and how can you be so blase about it? RICHIE: The answer to Sam’s unasked question was the same response that Richie gave to life in general, which was a shrug and a general acceptance of circumstances, and then interpreting these circumstances in the worst light possible. Student of all, master of none -- Richie knew that his power was limited because the effort he had to put forth to achieve the same results was always noticeably greater, but the usefulness of his power wasn’t lost on him. But it wasn’t all that important to him either -- unless he made a living out of being a mimic in some way, perpetual Vol lab rat or something, then it really didn’t matter to him. “The most obvious drawback is that I have to wait for people to use their power on me,” Richie pointed out, again adopting his disaffected youth stance by leaning on the near-by wall and staring off into the rest of the warehouse. Now, not disrespect -- just something resembling a casual conversation between two teammates. “Whereas you can use your power no matter what. And it wears off, eventually.” A pause -- he hadn’t meant to let that weakness slip out. “What about you?” Richie said evenly, and now he turned his head to Sam, eyebrows raised expectantly. “Any drawbacks?” SAM: Sam shrugged his considerable shoulders at this, “Not really. I mean, I know it sounds weird to say that, since a lot of people here do have their drawbacks. I mean sometimes it’s annoying that I can only do metal while others like Mason can control whatever they want, but I make do, get creative. I used to get the usual headaches when I pushed too hard, but I’ve put a lot of training in, and now I can go pretty far before I suffer any pain or exhaustion.” He rattled off his own details distractedly, the forefront of his thoughts still occupied with processing Richie’s information. “But you’ve got us, right?” He asked, switching streams sharply. “All you need is one of us to use our powers on you, and suddenly we’ve got double the strength. Once you’ve got comfortable with our abilities, that could be a huge asset. Here...” Sam lifted a hand, open palm, gesturing to a corner of the room that still had some supplies used to build ad hoc obstacle courses and other training structures. Two metal bars, about three feet in length each, flew across the room, deftly swerving around bodies until they found their way into Sam’s two hands. “Wanna give it a shot?” RICHIE: Each sentence was neatly stacked away in the library that was Richie’s mind -- information to use for a rainy day, or in case he had to break out of this hell hole. Whatever happened first, and he had a feeling it didn’t rain often in Australia. Not here, at least, from what he could gauge from the dry dust that kicked up during the day. Hilarious enough that Sam would have fucking trained though -- somehow, Richie was not surprised at all. In fact, he would have been more surprised if Sam didn’t. Richie eyed the bars warily. “A shot at what?” he asked. Richie was built differently than Sam -- there was muscle, but he was hammered lean and lithe like a panther than a bear or whatever the fuck Sam would be -- and his way of intimidating wasn’t so much as building himself up as huge and massive as it was about just being utterly blasé about everything. Especially about people, because nothing shook confidence more than just someone not caring. There was the expectant pause that Sam was supposed to fill in, and Richie had tucked his hands into his jacket pockets, opening up his body language just the slightest. SAM: Sam just smiles by way of answer, and slowly released his grip on the bar in his right hand, letting it hover in midair a couple feet in front of him. He waved his hand gently to and fro, and the bar responded with deft motions, cutting through the air with the parabola arcs of swordstrokes. With the purpose of the bars made clear, he then tossed the second one to his partner - not too aggressively, but not entirely a log either, with enough abrupt speed that it wasn’t meant to be caught with one’s hands. RICHIE: And, expectedly, it clattered to the ground, loudly, because Richie had sidestepped to the side. Halfway through it shuddered to a halt -- a half-assed attempt at minimizing attention -- though Riche was sure a few of their teammates had glanced over. Inwardly, he groaned: attention was the last thing he really wanted, which was why he preferred not to do or care about anything. The intent was to melt into the background, and it had worked for most of his life until Team Rooster, where people seemed to interpret it as a stupid challenge than the ‘keep away’ sign strapped to his chest. It took a moment but the bar rose up slowly. It wasn’t done haltingly, but it wasn’t a smooth ride completely either, several times slowly in speed as Richie took a moment to relax his mind. His hand outstretched, he guided the bar up until it was pointed at Sam. A breath, a brief moment of concentration, and Richie thought: move. The bar swung hard to the right but it broke out of Richie’s control, the sheer force of the swing throwing it against the wall. That was loud, but Richie hurriedly grabbed it -- and by grabbing, he had clenched the air in front of him and the bar had suddenly seized itself in mid-air -- before it hit the ground, letting it hover for a few moments before he brought it back to himself. There was a pause at his hiccuping presentation, Richie’s hand guiding the bar down onto the floor. He wanted to say, well, fuck that, because failure had never been easy, but instead, he shrugged, the perfect noncommittal reply. SAM: Sam watched the bar raise shakily into the air with a slightly cocked brow, taking note that at least some of Richie’s previous effortlessness must have been bravado. But then he remembered learning the ropes of his own powers, so he wasn’t about to start casting any judgements. “Hey, not bad. Now you’ll want to think of it like--WHOA!” Sam ducked sideways as the bar launched itself loudly against the far wall, having to resist the urge to reach out and catch it with his own mind. Instead he winced at the noise, tossing an apologetic smile at nearby teammates who were looking over in annoyance. “Not quite as easy as it looks, huh?” Sam offered, with only a hint of smugness in his tone. “When I started out it helped if I used my hands, y’know, like this.” He adopted a stance like a swordsman, or a baseball player at bat, and his own floating bar mimicked his stance, albeit about a foot away from his actual hands. RICHIE: Richie looked at Sam with a lot more skepticism than he meant to let on, and immediately, his arms went across his chest, as if to say, look, my hands are busy, no can do. There was a certain degree of humiliation that Richie realized was inherent in all training, but he wasn’t keen on playing over-exaggerated pretend here with Sam. “Like that,” he repeated. “Well, that is...” A pause. “Interesting.” Or not, but Richie wasn’t intending on his lies being believable so much as making it clear that he wasn’t going to be playing Vol baseball with some metal rods and some guy practically choking on good, ol’ Americana (as far as Richie was concerned -- Sam encapsulated everything that RIchie thought about the United States, on the off chance he did, more completely than Richie could imagine). SAM: Once he realized Richie was regressing into his laconic reverie, Sam’s own posture slackened, along with his expression. His metal bar continued to hover, but no longer seemed poised and at the ready. “I honestly don’t get it, man.” He said, and his tone was frank and curious. “You pretty much literally got the power to do anything here, and near as I can tell you refuse it just because you don’t want to put in the effort to try? I mean, come on.” With that Sam’s hands twitched, fingers moving in tiny patterns. Richie’s discarded bar leapt up to join his own, and began to spin and weave like batons, in what was evidently meant to be a display of how cool metallokinesis was. RICHIE: It was like talking to a golden retriever, in a way -- Sam was earnest and it would have worked on someone else, but this was Richie, and he had spent the majority of his time at IVI cementing it into his mind just how uncool being here was. It had rubbed him wrong the moment he had found out he had to go here and drop his life back home, and he had never made things easy for anyone with his attitude. He sighed. It did make him feel a little bad for Sam, and there was the momentary idea of humoring him, but that idea was immediately dispelled and thrown to the side. “Consider me lazy,” Richie said. He didn’t want to elaborate on the real reason. He kept his cards close to his chest. Whatever his teammates wanted to make of it, he didn’t really care -- he would do enough to not entirely inconvenience them and get them off his back, but anything more than the bare minimum was beyond him. SAM: Sam snorted at this, a sort of fatalistic sound that said I should have known. Still it wasn’t derisive, and when he spoke again, it was in the level, firm tone of a negotiator. “Alright well, look, you’ve got my power now, right? You can keep it for as long as you want, and maybe get in some practice when you’re on your own, and don’t have to worry so much about looking ‘uncool’. If you want to give it another shot, I’m game.” Even as he spoke a staffer sounded the bell to indicate the end of the training period, and Sam began to trot off towards the change rooms, though kept his eyes on Richie as he moved away, offering some parting words. “It was good working with you, Ducharme. I’m glad to see there’s a person under all that eye-rolling and arm-crossing.” RICHIE: There was a pause, where Richie considered saying something similar. Where he could have said, “Yes, Sam, it was fine working with you too.” They had managed, after all, not to kill each other for a day when put in immediate contact with one another, which was a feat in itself when the two boys could have probably glared holes through each other. Still could, in fact. But Richie had to admit, albeit unwillingly, Sam wasn’t an idiot. He could have said that. What Sam got was a shrug, a glance, as Richie began to move, walking past Sam. What Richie didn’t tell Sam was that he had also earned some of his grudging respect -- not much, but it was a start. |