InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "dylan is ugly lol"

tensor_mods (tensor_mods) wrote in tensor,
@ 2011-05-19 00:20:00

Entry tags:

ali_blaire, anna-marie_adler, callisto_leandros, domino_winter, jared_corbo, jay_guthrie, josh_foley, jubilation_lee, julian_keller, kevin_ford, kitty_pryde, open to all, petra_kristensen, piotr_rasputin, sam_guthrie

BOOM! at the Smithsonian (Saturday, May 21)
Though most of the week had been rainy, Saturday was shaping up to be a nice, sunny day. The change in weather had brought tourists and locals alike out of hiding, and the mall was buzzing with activity. The students and chaperons of the Xavier Academy were spread throughout the mall and museum buildings, having agreed upon times to meet up and check in before being sent off to see as much as possible in the time they had. By about an hour after lunchtime, a lot of them had breezed through at least one of the museums and were headed on to their scheduled tours or to their next destination.

Few, if any, really noticed the young man crossing the grass in front of the castle, wearing nothing that identified him as a member of any of the numerous school groups on the grounds that day. He was obviously disoriented, sweating profusely and staggering as he made his way out of the castle and across the mall. He stumbled once and nearly fell to his knees before he recovered, which prompted a girl nearby to stop and take notice of him. She asked him if he needed help, laid a hand on his shoulder as he turned wide, pain-filled eyes on her...and then they both disappeared in a blast of heat and light that ripped across the mall like a tiny nuclear explosion.

The people nearest the blast were incinerated almost instantly, though the heat dissipated away quickly as a concussive blast rolled across the lawn, tossing people in front of it like rag dolls thrown by a giant's hand. The west wing of the castle simply buckled at the impact, stone toppling down to crush the dozens of unsuspecting tourists in and around it before they even had time to register the explosion. The east wing buckled and groaned dangerously as well, its collapse simply slower and less complete as the shock wave continued on, buckling walls and foundations, blowing out windows and bringing down sections of roof in the buildings beyond.

But even as the initial explosion finally reached its limit, a domino effect magnified the chaos as hundreds of powered tourists, adults and children alike, reflexively powered up in response to the catastrophe, some of them losing control entirely. There were smaller explosions and tongues of flame here and there among the ruins as dust swirled in the air, and it was only a matter of moments before the first sirens began to wail in the distance. At the scene of the disaster, though, the sound of them was lost almost completely in the sound of panicked voices crying out in fear and pain.

(OOC: Please create sub-threads below for the events and immediate aftermath. Feel free to actually play out the actual explosion and how your character responds or to simply do a narrative of what happened to them and move to the aftermath if you're more comfortable with that. Remember, there's about a ten minute window of opportunity for heroism before local emergency responders and SHIELD will be on site and beginning to take over, though the cadets will definitely be co-opted into the rescue effort. The worst injured will, initially, be taken to area hospitals once rescued, but the Academy students will, once stable, be transported back to the school's med center for continuing treatment there. Parents are, of course, welcome to take their children home for treatment if they desire, but between the school and the SHIELD facility attached to it, they have access to pretty much the best healers in the country. This does, however, still mean a relatively slow recovery for anyone with severe injuries given the general caliber of even exceptionally talented healers does not begin to compare to the very very few omega healers scattered across the globe.)

ETA: GUYS, WE KINDA SUCK AND FORGOT TO TELL YOU THAT THEY GOT BUSED UP TO DC FRIDAY AFTER SCHOOL so they could have all of Saturday at the Smithsonian, and thus why they already got to see cool stuff Saturday before boom rather than spending it all on a bus. Also, for sleeping arrangements, if your roomie went you got matched up with them plus the 2 others you share a suite with (so 4 to a room, and if you have no PC/NPC roomies then NPCs will have taken the spots), other than the chaperons who got spread around in singles for supervisory purposes. Sorry!

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Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

_touchless_
2011-05-23 06:40 am UTC (link)

Julian surfaced from unconsciousness in quick strobe-bursts of awareness. He felt as if he were floating somewhere above his body, light and insubstantial as smoke. He dragged in a breath, dimly confused by the weak, serrated rasp even as he blinked away bits of grit and rubble.

His first thought was that it was incredibly dark, wherever he’d been spirited away to. His second was that he was sitting in a puddle.

“Kev—“ he began, voice giving out on the first syllable. Julian coughed, lips spattering with something wet and hot, and took another wheezing breath. The first hint of paint bloomed in his consciousness, unfurling slowly like a flower tipping its face to the sun.

Oh, he thought, adjusting to the dark, memory and awareness seeping in together. Oh, God, we’ve been crushed.

Then,

Oh God, Kevin’s been crushed.

He tried to squirm up, flip over, but something was pinning him from the hips down, keeping him frozen in place. He could feel the dull waves of agony begin to ripple through his limbs and knew with sickening dread that it would be upon him soon—the full extent of his injuries, whatever they were—and he didn’t have much time to act. Julian forced himself carefully up onto an elbow, alarmed at the way the world tilted crazily, but there—there was Kevin.

Pinned and, if he could trust his bleary eyes, not breathing.

Julian lifted a shaky hand, breath coming in and out like air slowly leaving a deflated balloon, and tried to lift the rock with tk. It was shockingly difficult, slipping through his usual iron control again and again, but finally he managed to roll the rock away and smooth a tk hand down Kevin’s chest. He wasn’t breathing, and the surge of panic Julian felt nearly overwhelmed him for a moment. His vision had never cleared and he was aware of blood splashing down from what felt like a large split in his skull—so much blood, bathing him, blinding him—but he had to do this. “Kevin,” he rasped, using tk to part his slack jaw, to push air into his lungs.

Pain was rising up, shaking him down to the core, but Julian studiously ignored it, focusing with everything he was on the gentle compressions, the funnel of air. TK CPR, making Kevin live—because, damn it, Julian was not going to lay there and watch him die. He’d never be able to live with himself, and he didn’t want to imagine the world where Kevin didn’t exist no matter how much they were supposed to hate each other now. “Kevin, damn it.”

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Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

_touchless_
2011-05-23 06:42 am UTC (link)

Kevin's awareness returned on the agony of his first independently drawn breath, shallow and rasping and accompanied by the drag of bone against bone as his heart beat an irregular tattoo. Even so, it look longer still for anything beyond the pain to register, and Kevin spent long moments trying to place the sound of his own voice shivering across an almost sub-vocal moan before he tried to jerk upright, eyes startling open in the dust-choked dimness.

"Josh?" His voice was weak and thready, and he fell back almost instantly with a choked off cry, panting shallowly against the pain lancing through his chest and belly as his body tried desperately to drag in enough air. Finally, though, memory began to filter past the haze of dizziness and disorientation, and the steadily building pulse of pain that seemed to come from everywhere at once, countered disturbingly by the pulse of his power.

"Julian?" he croaked instead, once he'd sucked in enough shallow, agonized breaths to find his voice.

He started to reach out blindly before years of ingrained habit over-rode even panic, and he jerked his hand back, cradled it against his chest as he looked wildly around in the dimness until he found Julian. And almost gagged at the sight of him, blood pouring down his face, standing out stark against pale skin and, god, possibly the white gleam of bone in the dimness.

It was only then that Kevin realized the steady buzz of power pulsing across his own skin had to be the feel of his blood ashing as it welled up. Doing it so steadily, in so many places, that he couldn't actually identify any source for the sensation, any more than he could accurately trace the source of his own pain past it, though he knew dimly that some of it had to be from where his legs disappeared beneath the rubble that seemed to be mostly immobilizing him.

"Julian?" he asked again, forcing his eyes to focus, forcing back the panic as he realized they were both trapped, pinned by the remnants of the building, and he couldn't hear anything past the sound of the wreckage shifting and settling, Julian's weak, wet breaths, and his own labored breathing. "...oh Jesus."

“Thank God,” Julian moaned before crumpling back onto the hot, wet ground. The pool of blood was slowly spreading out around him, seeping between cracks in the rock, making his shirt cling to bruised skin. He tried to lift his hand to touch his head, but he couldn’t seem to make his body behave the way it should. “How bad—“ He sucked in a breath; he couldn’t seem to find the air he needed fast enough. “Are you hurt?”

At the the sound of Julian's voice, the way he collapsed weakly back, Kevin tried to move again, to get closer and see how bad it was. That was enough for the pain to break through the buzz of his powers, though, and he froze, teeth clenched against a grunt of pain.

When he could breathe - and think and move - past it he pushed himself up more carefully, breath hissing between his teeth as he tried to focus on the burn of his powers, no matter what they meant, rather than the pain lancing through him. He managed to shift himself enough that he could look down on Julian, could reach out and touch him if he dared, and had to choke back a frightened sound as he registered all the blood. Spilling down Julian's face, saturating his clothes, spreading in the dimness around him.

"Not...sure," he finally rasped when he could spare the breath, ignoring the the grinding ache in his chest that came with each careful breath, the wet prick of tears in the corners of his eyes. "It's...hard to feel anything past my power," he admitted, voice still a quiet rasp, but coming a bit easier as he learned to ration his breath, keep each one shallow and careful to avoid the sharpest pain. "But. Better than you. I think."

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Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

_touchless_
2011-05-23 06:43 am UTC (link)

Julian tried to focus on Kevin’s face, scanning his injuries. “I’m trying to—think about—what we’re supposed to—do next,” he said, words scattered by wheezing breaths. “Binding. We need to—bind the wounds to stop—bleeding. I think I used everything I—had to do CPR. But. Maybe if I rest.”

He shifted weakly, lashes flickering. It was so dark, and getting gradually darker, but Kevin seemed to glow in the dim. Julian could feel the hum of electricity coming from him, could smell…flowers? That didn’t seem right.

“All that time, I—never blamed him for wanting you,” he said, almost dreamily. He closed his eyes. “Smart. Sharp. Sometimes I wished I—was him. Is there enough air?” Julian’s eyes flickered open again, awareness brightening his bloodied face again.

"CPR?" he asked before any of the rest of it registered, his brain only sluggishly processing Julian's words and trying to make sense of them. "Shh, don't...don't try to talk," he added in a pained whisper once he sorted his way to the end, skipping past the middle for now in a stunned daze to focus on what was most important here and now.

"Just...stay still...rest." Kevin didn't want to tell Julian that there was plenty of air, didn't want to think of the wheezing rasp of his breath and why he wasn't getting enough.

He started to reach for Julian again, hesitated as he checked to make sure his glove was undamaged, then laid his hand - so incredibly carefully - on Julian's shoulder where there was...less blood. He wasn't sure there was anyplace with no blood. He couldn't reach much father than that. He couldn't even try to bind up all the places Julian was seeping his life away into the hard stone beneath them, couldn't let himself think of all the places he might be doing the same as power continued to shock through him.

"Someone...will come...soon. Then...then Josh'll heal you. Good as new." His voice broke on emotion this time, not pain, and he squeezed Julian's shoulder as gently as he could, needing the touch almost desperately as he listened anxiously for each wheezing breath.

“Josh is—good for that,” Julian said, leaning toward the touch. He turned his face away, coughing weakly, blood spattering in small drops to pool with all the rest. “God, we’re in a—sorry state.”

He didn’t want to stop talking. There was a growing part of him that was afraid to stop—afraid he’d never be able to start again.

Then he turned his face back to Kevin, eyes dim but grave. “I’m sorry I—hurt you. I never wanted to.”

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Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

_touchless_
2011-05-23 06:43 am UTC (link)

"Don't. Please." He dragged himself closer, ignoring the pain as it bloomed past his powers, changing from a dull ache into something fierce and clawing in his chest and belly, ignoring, too, the way things shifted strangely and the position of his left leg didn't move or change beneath the rubble despite how he'd managed to alter the angle of his hips.

That didn't matter, getting closer did. He shifted his grip from Julian's shoulder to the side of his neck, needing to feel the erratic rhythm of his heart, wishing almost more than he ever had in his life that he could strip his glove away and just touch.

"I know. I know you didn't. It's not...not your fault. It's not...anyone's fault." Tears were the one thing that didn't ash against his skin and they tracked across his cheeks, leaving muddy channels in the dirt and ash coating his face. "Please, just...just hold on for him. For...for us," he whispered, voice anguished with the realization that it wasn't just for Josh's sake that he couldn't bear to lose Julian.

“I don’t want—you to die,” Julian managed to gasp. His heart felt strange. Too tight, too hard, as if it a hand had reached into his chest to squeeze it tight. There were three Kevins now, the center one glowing in the dim, the others slowly fading into black. “Please.”

"I won't," Kevin promised, quick and fierce. "Neither of...us will." He smoothed his thumb over Julian's pulse, barely able to feel the thready rhythm through his glove, and looked frantically around.

Light was filtering in from dozens of gaps in the rubble that encapsulated them, but they were tiny, the sum of them all providing just barely enough light to make out the details of Julian's face, the blood saturating his clothes and pooling around him washed almost to gray scale with only flashes picked out in vibrant crimson. It was almost more like a noir illustration than anything actually happening to real people. Happening to them.

"Someone...has to be...looking for us." Except neither of them had been where they were supposed to be...and who knew if whatever catastrophe had dropped the building had left anyone to look for them. "We just...need to help them...find us."

“Emma,” Julian breathed, weakly holding on to Kevin’s gloved hand.

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Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

_touchless_
2011-05-23 06:44 am UTC (link)

Kevin shifted so he could squeeze Julian's hand back. "Is...she close?" he asked, straining his ears further, praying to a god he hadn't really believed in for years that she was, that she'd find them, as he looked for some way to draw attention to their position.

He tried to search for her with his mind, but it was getting difficult to think clearly. "Don't," he began, then simply let his eyes close. He relaxed back, succumbing to the incredible, terrible, smothering darkness that was steadily settling in around him.

"Julian?" It came out more a breath than a word, panic squeezing his chest as Julian's voice faded away and his eyes slipped shut. Kevin let go of Julian's hand and pressed gloved fingers to his throat again, nearly sobbing with relief when he found a pulse. Thready and erratic, but there.

It seemed darker now, like Julian's eyes had taken some of the dim light with them when they closed, and his own labored breathing seemed terrifyingly loud as Julian's went even shallower. Kevin looked away, he couldn't stand to see the pale, blood-drenched death's head of Julian's face without his consciousness to animate it. Looked away and tried, desperately, to think of something he could do.

He couldn't move whatever was trapping his legs, had barely managed to shift the few inches that let him reach Julian and even that had exhausted him. The dull ache of something terribly wrong in his belly and chest was slowly overwhelming the distracting buzz of his power, becoming sharp, stabbing pains, and the artificial boost of energy and awareness his power was giving him was gradually being counterbalanced by the blood loss that was creating it.

A few feet away, near where one of the larger chinks in the rubble let a thin ray of light in, the debris seemed to be littered through with wood, maybe studs from some interior wall, and he thought, dimly, that if he could just move those, things might shift. Might open up a gap big enough that someone, Emma, might see it. Might find them. If he could reach. But he couldn't. Not with his hands.

"I'm...sorry," he whispered, breath rasping louder and chest grating with the effort of talking. He shifted his hand from Julian's pulse and used it to strip his other glove off, the one farthest from Julian. Laid his bare hand to the cold stone next to him, on the shortest line between himself and the organic debris, and tried to feel it. Let his eyes slip shut and focused on bridging the gap of cold stone and metal, inorganic and dead to his powers, the way he'd managed a handful of times in training. Gasped quietly at the surge as his powers reached and pushed and then everything else was lost in the clatter of shifting rock and a choking cloud of dust and light streaming in, bright and strong.

Kevin blinked stupidly at the opening, blinded by the brightness, then groped for Julian's hand, squeezing it tight again as he slumped back against the rubble and closed his eyes. "There," he whispered. He didn't know if it was enough, but it was the best he could do.

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Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

prima_frost
2011-05-23 07:35 pm UTC (link)

Emma had been with Jubilee when the blast happened, turning to diamond as soon as she'd registered the explosion. But in the end it hadn't been necessary as there'd been a curious field of calm right near them. So she'd cautiously dropped back into her regular form and cast out a wide mental net, looking for her friends. The resulting cacophony was too much for her and she shut it all down quickly.

She'd have to focus. Find one person and go from there. Because there was no way she was going to just sit there and wait for rescue. She opened up again, this time focused on the easiest person to find: Julian. Except he wasn't there just then. And then he was - faint but there. She started in the direction she'd sensed him in, carefully picking her way through everything until he faded again. In a panic she reached for whoever was closest. He'd had someone with him, another mental presence she'd barely touched. But now she could feel it stronger. Kevin. He was with Kevin and they were straight ahead.

She kept going until she saw a hole in a pile of rubble and knew that was where they were. And to get to them she'd need her diamond form.

"Julian?" she called as she shifted. Julian? Kevin? she broadcast to both of them, hoping for a response.

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	Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle _touchless_ 2011-05-23 07:53 pm UTC (link)
	Kevin's eyes fluttered open again and he made a vague, inquiring noise. He wasn't sure if he'd heard someone or if he was just imagining it. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle prima_frost 2011-05-25 02:42 am UTC (link)
	Emma dug through the hole a little, pulling bits of rubble out of the way. Julian! Kevin! she called again. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle _touchless_ 2011-05-25 02:50 am UTC (link)
	He was too incoherent to register that the voice was in his head, just that he wasn't imagining it. That it actually was a voice and someone was looking for them...someone had found them. "Here," he called, or tried to. It came out a dry rasp, barely above a whisper as he struggled to draw more air in past the pain squeezing his chest like a vise. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle prima_frost 2011-05-25 03:05 am UTC (link)
	She heard that. And she could get a sense of Kevin there, somewhere inside. She worked faster, clearing more of a hole. "Kevin!" she called out loud. "I'm coming through. Is Julian with you?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle

_touchless_
2011-05-25 03:13 am UTC (link)

Kevin squeezed Julian's hand harder and turned his head to look at him, straining to see the faint rise and fall of his chest, needing that confirmation even though he could still hear the harsh, shallow rasp of his breathing.

"Yes." It was more thought than word this time, as he'd finally realized who was there, though he probably wouldn't have without Julian's last words.

Hurry. Please. He didn't know if she could hear him this way, but he was too tired to try and make himself heard over the sound of shifting debris.

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	Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle prima_frost 2011-05-25 03:28 am UTC (link)
	Emma redoubled her efforts, finally catching a glimpse of them through the hole she'd been working on. I'm coming, she assured him. As fast as I can. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	Re: Julian and Kevin (and Emma?) in the Castle _touchless_ 2011-05-25 03:36 am UTC (link)
	"Told you," he mumbled, quiet enough that Julian probably wouldn't have heard even if he'd been conscious. "Gonna be...fine. Just...hold on." (Reply to this) (Parent)

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