InsaneJournal

Who: Kevin Tran and Percy Jackson
What: Kevin’s a little worried about one of his students.
When: Backdated: Monday, February 10th. Afternoon
Where: USC campus
Rating: Family Friendly
Status: Complete


“So...that should be everything that Professor Milligan wanted me to cover for the midterm. Any questions?” Kevin looked out across the computer lab at the faintly bored--but mostly tired--expressions of his freshmen. A couple of them shook their heads, but the rest were packing up their backpacks and bags and looking wistfully at the door. “Okay, go on. Get some sleep. And eat a vegetable! You can’t actually live on hot dogs and Monster drinks alone.”

There were a few smiles at that, and Kevin worked on shutting down the projection station as the students filed out.

Percy had been happy to finally get into some of the courses he needed for his major, but of course that meant more work. He made sure that he took his ADHD meds each day so that it’d be a little easier to pay attention, but there was still the dyslexia, which in the dreams meant that his brain was hardwired to read Ancient Greek and he suspected that now it’s what his brain was trying to do with most of the things he read. It was good that he had a girlfriend as smart as Annabeth, despite her own problems with ADHD and Dyslexia, so she could help him if he needed it and there was the tutoring center that he went to daily for help.

As class ended, Percy picked up his bag and slung it over his shoulder, rubbing a hand over his face, trying to recall the lesson they’d just gone over so that he would be able to do his homework later.

Kevin liked Percy--he was a bright kid with decent scores, so he’d been surprised by the paperwork that he’d received from the Dean of Students office that said that he had dyslexia and ADHD. He probably didn’t need to ask if he was okay and let him know that he’d gotten the paperwork, but as the kid walked by, he seemed a little glazed and out of it, so Kevin thought that maybe it didn’t hurt to check in, make sure he was doing okay. “Hey--Percy? You got a minute?”

Percy hadn’t expected to hear his name spoken as he walked by, but he stopped and turned back towards Kevin, adjusting the strap of his bag as he did, “Yeah, sure. What’s up?” When Percy had thought about college, before he’d graduated, he’d pictured either old professors or professors that looked like celebrities, like in the movies and on TV, but once he’d gotten to college, he found that the professors weren’t that much different than his teachers in high school. In addition to the professors there were also TAs like Kevin, who Percy thought was pretty cool and he found it a little easier to listen to someone close to his own age.

“Nothing big,” Kevin assured him. “It’s just confidential. You have a few minutes to walk to my office?” He picked up his messenger bag and slung it over his shoulder, then grabbed his traveler cup that used to hold coffee, but had been empty for about half the study session. He waved to a couple other students who passed by. “If not, that’s cool too. We can schedule a time for you to come by for a few minutes whenever’s good for you.”

“Yeah, sure.” Percy wasn’t sure what Kevin wanted to talk to him about that was confidential and he was just a little worried that he was in trouble for something, not that he could think of anything he could have done. “I’m not being expelled or anything, am I?” Of course, if that were the case it would probably be the Dean telling him and not a TA and he’d probably have to do something really horrible to get expelled and as far as Percy could recall, the worst thing he’d probably done since coming to school was get drunk at that one party him and Annabeth had gone to back in October.

Kevin laughed and headed for the door. His office was in the basement, shared by a half dozen other TAs, and it would take a few minutes for them to get there. “Seriously, it’s no big deal. It’s just the university’s policy.” But if the guy was worried about being expelled it made him curious if he was hiding something. “How’re things going, anyway?” he asked, friendly. “How’s your schedule? You’re a freshman, right? So you should be feeling only slightly suicidal at this point,” he joked. Black humor. Gallows humor. There was a sense of camaraderie and desperation that only other CS majors understood.

Percy didn’t have anything to hide; not in the waking world anyway. He was simply used to the fact that in his dreams, he’d been expelled from more schools than he could count because of the strange things that happened around him, which he’d found out later had been monsters trying to get him because he was a demi-god, so it made sense that his mind would go there when Kevin wanted to talk to him. However, now he needed to figure out how to make light of it, “I was only kidding. Just made me a little nervous for a second.” He laughed as he followed Kevin, “Yeah, I am. And I probably would be if it weren’t for the fact that my girlfriend is really smart and has been helping me when I’m not at the tutoring center.”

“That’s good--taking advantage of the tutoring center,” Kevin replied, flashing him a grin. “I know it well.” They turned a corner and headed downstairs, crowded with students going about their business during the break between classes. “Remind me--because there are like, a hundred of you and it’s still early in the semester--are you from California? Or are you a transplant? No judgment, I promise. My girlfriend’s originally from Michigan.”

“Yeah, I’ve been going there whenever I need to since the beginning of the year. Usually a couple times a week,” Percy said, following Kevin’s lead downstairs, “I’m originally from New York City. My girlfriend is from here, which is part of the reason I came out here.” Okay, so Annabeth was the main reason he’d decided to go to school on the West Coast, “We weren’t dating then, but we’ve been friends for a long time and I knew she’d applied here and I thought it’d be fun to finally go to the same school so I looked it up and decided to surprise her.” His planned surprise had been foiled when she’d seen him on campus first, but she was still surprised to see him none the less.

“Wow, that’s...dedicated,” Kevin replied. And slightly stalkery, but who was he to judge without knowing the details? Obviously Percy’s girlfriend hadn’t minded. He navigated the hallways easily, leading the freshman through the bowels of the building to his office, digging through his bag for his keyring. He found it, eventually, and managed to get the heavy door to turn and shouldered his way inside. “Not that I blame you for leaving New York. You must be enjoying your first SoCal winter, huh?”

“Well, I wanted a change too. I’d never been to California before. My girlfriend and I met at a summer camp up north.” Annabeth had teased Percy about being slightly stalkery, but that’s all it was, a bit of teasing, because she’d been happy to see him regardless of the fact that he hadn’t told her that he would be going to school there too. “Yeah, they’ve gotten a bunch of snow this year, according to my mom and I was there for Christmas and New Years.” And then there had been that freak snow that the OC had gotten right before Christmas.

“Seems to be going around,” Kevin muttered, because yeah, he remembered the snow they’d gotten. It wasn’t totally unheard of for Southern California to get snow--they did have mountains, after all--but it usually didn’t effect the city. Once the door was closed, Kevin led Percy over to his desk--which was covered with stacks of papers and a collection of mecha figurines and Heroclix. “So--we got your paperwork about your dyslexia and ADD, so if you need any accommodations, you should let me or Professor Milligan know as early as possible. Some of them--like alternate test-taking locations--are easy enough to organize, but there’s still paperwork. Due dates are trickier, but you can make your requests, and Brett will make the decision. Okay? Any questions?”

As they entered the office, Percy took a look around, smirking a little as he saw the things on Kevin’s desk. Percy had a couple collectable action figures at home and a few less collectable ones that he kept on his desk and shelf back at his dorm. He’d been worried about what his roommate would think before he’d gotten to school and found out that his roommate was a pothead and didn’t really care. When Kevin started talking again, Percy glanced up and nodded, “Yeah, that’s one reason I take advantage of the tutoring center so much.” He wasn’t surprised that Kevin and his professor had been given paperwork on his conditions, because all his other teachers ever had gotten it too. “So far I’m doing alright. I’ve just had a lot of other things going on too. I’m trying to get over a fear of water that I’ve had for the last few years and then there’s the dreams.” He said it before really thinking about it, which was one trait that Percy had; speaking before thinking.

“...dreams?” Kevin repeated. He couldn’t help but be curious, and he huffed a breath, ducked his head as he fidgeted with one of his mechas. “Seems like that’s going around too,” he murmured. He was still more than a little freaked out from his meeting last week that had involved strangers appearing and disappearing, claims of dreams, and angels, and of him being a prophet, and general weirdness (though he wasn’t entirely convinced that some of the weirdness wasn’t Dean and Scud by themselves). “Yours don’t involve angels or prophets, do they?” he asked, warily.

“Mine involve gods and demi-gods. I’m the son of Poseidon in mine.” Over the last couple of months Percy had gotten used to the dreams and the things he’d gotten from them so far, which included his sword and Camp Half-Blood T-shirt. “My girlfriend is the daughter of Athena. But she’s not my girlfriend in the dreams. We’re only twelve in the dreams.” He couldn’t help but wonder if maybe someday they’d be more than friends, because they had been standing awfully close in that picture he’d gotten around Christmas of them when they were older with some others that he didn’t recognize. “The dreams are pretty crazy, huh?”

Kevin cleared his throat, feeling awkward. “I, uh. I actually wouldn’t know,” he answered, slowly. “I just...met some people who said they knew me in a dream. I’m not sure what to make of it, honestly.” He forced a laugh and tried to shift the focus away from himself. “Yours sound pretty awesome, though. Like an anime. Or a comic book.”

“Well, when you do start having them, you’ll know the difference between them and regular dreams right away.” Percy tried to explain the difference between the dreams and regular dreams, “You know those dreams you have that feel real? They feel even more real than those.” As crazy as his dreams were, he’d gotten used to them by now, “Yeah, I guess they kind of are.”

Would he have them? Did he even want to? Kevin swallowed and smiled, somewhat wry. What were the odds that one of his students would have dreams like the ones he’d heard about? It made him curious about how many other people he knew had them too, and made him a little less skeptical that Dean had been jerking him around. “Anyway--thanks for stopping by, Percy. And let me know if you need anything, okay? Whether it be class-related or uh...other things.”

Percy nodded and adjusted the strap of his bag on his shoulder, “Yeah, of course. If I need anything I’ll know where to go.” He smiled then headed towards the door of Kevin’s office. He hoped that if and when Kevin started dreaming, he’d have other people who had the same dreams so that he’d have a support system like he had with Annabeth.