log: marvel, mutant manor - jack/rachel Who: Jack and Rachel What: Jack is working on being a normal person again, and meets a psychic instead. Where: Outside the mutant manor house, DC Door. When: Fuzzy. Around the time he sees Luke and Max, before seeing anyone else. Warnings/Rating: None for now.
So far, Jack had made it as far as the manor grounds, and even that was a gauntlet of sensory experiences. Turning down the volume on sight and smell and sound was an exhausting upward battle, so he had become somewhat nocturnal in his first few days at the manor house. He kept clear of the rest of the occupants during the day, aside from the occasional trip to get food or a book to take back to his room. He tried to rest and do things that involved not thinking, reading anything public on his journal to pass the time.
At night, when everything had quieted, it was easier to go out. When he stepped outside at after dark, the world stopped being an overwhelming mess of input. It sorted itself into moving wildlife, swaying tree boughs, and distant sounds. The days were getting easier by inches, but the nights were a relief, a chance to get outside and stretch his legs, a chance to move, to keep from feeling penned in. He was keen on that, on not feeling like a prisoner anymore.
He wasn't sleeping much, and he should have been wan from it, dark under the eyes, but he looked healthy and well-rested as could be. He thought he remembered ripping a steel door from its hinges, but it was a distant enough fragment that he wasn't sure he hadn't created it, an added detail in a memory dreamed over and over.
The quiet of the cool, still evening was a balm, even if it did feel open and exposed to be standing alone out on the grounds, even in the dark. Summer hadn't had a chance to really kick in yet, so there was still a vague chill in the air this late. He could hear a rabbit moving in the underbrush nearby, birds rustling quietly in their roosts, and the cacophony of leaves clattering against each other in the trees.
So much of his being lately felt like a salted wound. Talking had become such a frustrating and embarrassing act that he had done precious little of it since he'd come to the manor. But what was there to say that he actually wanted to talk about, anyway? He much preferred standing in the quiet cool.