Agent Carolina (topoftheboard) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-04-24 09:11:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, agent carolina, maxwell trevelyan (the inquisitor), nasir |
Who: Maxwell Trevelyan, Nasir, & Agent Carolina
What: Bodyswap shenanigans!
When: 12:01 AM Friday morning
Where: Max's house, then a random gym
Warnings: Low for hilarity! Probably a bit of cursing somewhere.
Status: Complete on posting!
It wasn’t unheard of for Nasir to spend the night at Max’s place; by now he even had his own toothbrush to use. Sometimes the opposite happened, though Max’s bed - and his house in general - was bigger, so there was more space. He’d heard somewhere that the key to a successful relationship (and they hadn’t officially called it that, was he supposed to call it that, make an announcement on the network, write a poem, do something? Sometimes these sorts of things were confusing) was a king-size bed, and that was probably true - the space was there, if necessary, but he was kind of a cuddler so not like it got utilized all that often. Maybe in his sleep, unconsciously, but then when the sun rose he was usually right back into snuggling mode.
And nothing besides heated snuggling happened, which was fine - he wasn’t going to push that issue, couldn’t even conceive of doing so. Nasir had been through a lot, he didn’t trust easily and built up those iron defenses surrounded by brambles - to give yourself to someone so intimately was a big deal, and while Trevelyan had his share of flings, that wasn’t what this was. He’d wait as long as necessary.
Tonight he was definitely clinging, though. Officially at Clinger: Stage 5 Mode and he had to be up early for work purposes - he was due to give a talk at one of Orange County’s high schools, part of a program for NAMI, and the talk on mental illness would be recorded and edited by Revy later then posted online. The clock was about to flip over to midnight, so not entirely late in the scheme of things, but it had been a long day beforehand and he was looking forward to a good sleep so he’d wake up refreshed and ready to inspire giggling, hormonal teenagers (talks at high schools were always...interesting).
“I’ll try not to wake you when I get up,” he promised - and he was the big spoon, so he was nuzzling into his bed partner from behind. “But I’ll leave breakfast in the fridge.” Honestly, the shit Nasir ate sometimes - all part of a college student’s diet but really.
Nasir’s eyes had been closed as he lay beside Max, but as the clock clicked over to 12:01 AM, a very different person opened them. Carolina surveyed the room and immediately knew something was very definitely wrong. This was not the gym, nor was it the sparring ring she had just entered. She could still hear the ringing of the bell that had signified the start of the match. She had managed to convince the owner to let her have the first spar of the day, set to start at exactly midnight.
What had happened to the fight? Had she been drugged? Those had to have been some pretty potent drugs to not let her remember how she had gone from fighting to a very large bed. She was laying down sideways on the bed, being held by two arms that most definitely had not been there a second ago. It may have been Nasir’s body that tensed up, muscles coiling as the fight or flight reflex was kicking in, but it was Carolina that chose fight.
Years of martial arts training had given her the knowledge of how to break out of a back hold, even though this felt nothing like the chokeholds she was used to. Which was probably for the best because her arms also felt nothing like they should have. She felt like she was back to her awkward teen years as she grabbed the top arm, lifting it over her head and pinning it next to the other over her shoulder. Twisting, one hand pushed the arms into the bed as leverage while her free arm headed up to press into the man’s neck. She wanted answers, and she wanted them now.
“Who the hell are you?” Carolina growled, but the sound was odd in her ears. Deeper. Rougher. Her eyes landed on the forearm that was against Max’s neck. Whose arm was that? What the fuck was going on? Where was this? Even in her surprise, she held the hold. “And what the fuck did you do to me?”
Maker’s bloody balls, what had just happened?
Max had been about to plunge into sleep - his body was tired, his brain shutting off, but then all of a sudden he was pinned to his own bed by the person he least expected to attack him (considering that they’d been snuggling five minutes earlier). He was so startled it was a jolt to his system, and a jolt to the rest of the appliances in the room - lightning summoned, every bulb burst and shattered, an overload, as the zing of magical energy pulled from the Fade rippled over his skin like he was an electric eel.
“What - “ he managed to choke out since, well, with an arm pressed to his throat that made it difficult to talk. His vocal chords were protesting a little. “Nasir...what are you doing?! It’s just me, it’s Max.”
He knew Nasir had nightmares sometimes, but this was a whole different sort of episode. It was like he didn’t even recognize anything. “We were about to go to sleep, that’s all. Can you just...” Not kill him? Please?
Carolina started when the bulbs burst behind them and she turned to make sure that there was no one else in the room. As far as she could tell, they were alone. For now. There was no way for her to know if this guy had backup waiting behind the door. Normally, she would not have been overly worried about fighting off a bodyguard or two. That was just the nature of her previous occupation. However, her body was different and she was not sure if she could fight like she normally did, especially if there were any leftover drugs in her system.
“Who the hell is Nasir?” That had better not be his new ‘pet name’ for her, because she was going to have more than a few things to say about being anyone’s ‘pet’. Carolina moved her face closer to the other man’s in the now-complete darkness. She did not recognize this ‘Max’, but he was talking as if she should. He was answering her questions, but the answers were not making any sense.
“How did I get here? Did you drug my water?” Oh, she was going to have more than a few choice words with that damn owner if he had anything to do with this. That money-grubbing ass probably had not even thought twice about selling some strange woman from out of town. After she figured out what the hell they had done to her, she was going to go after him so that she could pay it forward - right into his nose.
She let up on his throat just enough so that he could give her longer answers, but she was ready to put her arm - is that really my arm?! - right back if he tried anything. “Where is this place, Max?”
Now, Max had a lot of training - in his line of work, it just made sense. He spent his days talking people down from the edge, and it wasn't like he counseled the wall or anything. People were complex creatures, he knew that firsthand. But this was falling under 'what the actual fuck?' and he was rapidly trying to come up with some way to handle what was clearly an out of body experience.
Oh. Oh?
"Nasir is you," he growled, taking a big gulp of air - sweet, blessed oxygen - now that he could actually breathe. "Look - " Max shifted just enough to try and get some feeling back into his limbs; at least he was calmer and wasn't going to set the house ablaze. "Look in the mirror. If you're not Nasir, then why are you in his body? And who even is this?”
Questions he'd never thought he'd ask anyone for $500, Alex. But now that he’d mentioned it, he was a little concerned that someone else actually was in Nasir’s body - even if that didn’t really happen, did it?
Well. He’d recently spent some time killing Deepstalkers underground, with his magical Staff, and if that was a thing in Orange County then pretty much anything else was fair game too. "And I didn't do anything, before you accuse me. I’m just a therapist-slash-mage who lives in Anaheim yet my magic doesn’t extend to mind transference.”
“His body?” A few things were rapidly becoming obvious to Carolina as she watched Max’s reactions. If what he was saying was true - and it was looking like it actually might be - then she was in this Nasir person’s body. Which meant that she had not been drugged and kidnapped to who knows where. Nor would Max have any clue where she was supposed to be.
Carefully, Carolina untangled herself from her position above Max and slipped off of the bed. Mirror. He had said something about a mirror. She went to find one so that she could see or herself what the hell he was talking about. The moment she stood on solid ground she could already feel that something was off. Am I...shorter? She did not quite stumble as she grabbed a hold of the first reflective surface she could find. In this case, a window.
The person staring back at her was most definitely not the red haired woman she had seen in the mirrors of the gym’s locker room. First of all, he was definitely male with dark hair. She could not tell the exact shade in the darkness.
Who the fuck is this? I’m a guy?! How the hell... She swallowed the panicked cry that threatened to surface. “I’m…Carolina.” At least, I thought I was.
“If this isn’t my body then…” That meant that Nasir might be in her body. Her body, that was about to fight the gym’s top fighter in a three round, no-holds-barred sparring match. Oh shit. Carolina paled a bit. Did Nasir even know how to fight? What was going to happen to her body? She could be killed if he was not careful. “And I think Nasir is about to be in a lot of trouble.”
Nasir was, indeed, about to be in a lot of trouble.
The poor guy currently aiming a fist at his face was about to be in even more, though.
As his world suddenly shifted and he found himself, not lying in bed being spooned and whispered to tenderly, but on a mat with bright lights shining overhead, he couldn’t do anything but blink in confusion. The guy took that to his advantage, catching him in the jaw in a way that made his ears ring and the world spin sideways for a short moment. Nasir staggered back, shocked, and stared at the man in terror for a brief moment. But then his face changed, morphing with fury, and he hissed at the man in irritation.
He may have had no idea what was going on, or what had happened, or why he was here, but goddammit, now he was mad. And this guy was in the line of fire. He had just enough time to curse very liberally before Nasir’s hands - which were wrapped in sparring gloves, for some reason, and if he’d been thinking clearly that would have made him realize that he wasn’t being attacked - were wrapped around his throat.
It took three people to pull him off, hissing and spitting and scratching the whole time, and as soon as he was clear the other man took off running until he was a safe distance away. “You guys saw that, right? She just attacked me! What the fuck!”
What the fuck indeed. The ‘she’ set Nasir off again, and he did his best to lunge for the man - he’d heard plenty of comments about how ‘girly’ or ‘delicate’ he was, and he hated every single one of them, and now this asshole had the gall to call him a girl to his face? He was gonna die, that’s all there was to it.
The man that his opponent had spoken to nodded, turning a stink eye towards Nasir and tossed his head towards the door. “Take her out, I’ll go get her shit. Fuckin’ crazy bitch,” he mumbled as he walked by, and Nasir went for him as well. His handlers managed to drag him out, shoving him out onto the sidewalk. The man from before appeared and handed him a few items, including a cell phone. “Come around here again and I’ll call the fuckin’ cops, Carolina,” he said, before he slammed the door. Nasir heard the distinct sound of a lock clicking into place, but didn’t really process it.
Carolina…? Who the fuck was Carolina?
With the cooler night air on his face (and the benefit of no one trying to hold him down, which tended to send him into a panic - and rightfully so, he felt), he managed to calm down a little. Enough to look down at himself and notice something very important.
He had boobs.
He heard the phone ring and felt it vibrate in his hand, and he answered it almost on autopilot, to busy staring down at himself and his newly acquired chest. “Hello?” he asked, before he had the sense to check who was calling. He pulled the phone away from his ear and glanced at the screen.
That was his number. That was calling him. On a phone that wasn’t his.
This was very quickly becoming some horror movie territory. He pulled the phone back and growled out, “You better have a good fucking explanation for this, whoever you are.”
Nasir had boobs and also a very feminine lilt to his voice. But rest assured, it was just Max calling since he really had no other way to fix this situation than to take Nasir’s own cell phone and call Carolina’s number with it. “It’s me,” he said, and with a wave of his hand - contained magic, controlled magic, for the love of Andraste’s knickers - he lit a few of his emergency candles so Carolina could actually get a better glimpse of herself in the mirror, with actual light.
He’d find a spare bulb or two in a second, to fix that problem, but one thing at a time. “There’s...I think you switched bodies with someone. Somehow. So you should come over.”
A spare lightbulb and pants. Max really needed to find those things, plus maybe a shirt. It was just that when he went to bed in boxer briefs he didn’t expect to wake up this way. “Do you need us to come get you? Where even are you?” He glanced at Carolina. “Where is he?” Since obviously she would know.
“Saul’s Boxing, in Huntington Beach.” Carolina replied absently as she turned back from the mirror to where Max was currently hunting for clothing. She blinked as she realized that the room was a lot brighter now. Candles? When had he lit those? She had not even heard the click of a lighter or a flick of a match. Not that she had been paying too much attention.
The mysterious candles could wait. There were more important things right now. Like also finding pants. Jesus, what in the hell was going on? She remembered Max saying something about being a therapist. She’d probably need one after this was over. It had to be over at some point, right? Right. Hopefully this was not one of God’s permanent jokes. She had worked damned hard to be acknowledged as a woman in the marines and she was proud of being a woman in general. Which she was not at this moment.
Carolina’s bent to scratch an itch on her leg but froze as the feeling of something very unfamiliar hit her thigh. Nope. Definitely not a woman. She cleared her throat, fighting off a blush as she tried once again to find clothing that would fit her...him...this body. “My keys are in the right pocket inside of my purse. Green station wagon.” Ah! There! Those looked like they might fit. “That ass Saul had better not have done anything to my body...err, Nasir. Him. Or I’ll kick his ass right back to Brooklyn.”
Nasir relaxed at hearing Max’s voice, scrubbing a hand over his face. What the fuck. Switched bodies. “I hate this fucking place,” he mumbled, then, louder, “Can you switch us back, do you think? Or do you know someone who does? Because this - “ he gestured to himself, even though neither of them could see it - “is honestly the weirdest thing that’s happened to me.”
He felt it prudent to mention that he’d never really learned to drive, that he’d only just barely gotten his license before...everything, because that would just complicate things even more. He’d figure it out. Besides, it was late, hopefully not too many people would be on the road.
...and hopefully the car wasn’t a stick. There’d be a problem if it was a stick. Instead, he fished the keys out and went to try and find the car, though he was unwilling to hang up the phone.
“Is Saul the guy who was aiming a fist at your face? My face. This face - the guy you were fighting, let’s go with that. Because I…” he paused, because telling your I-think-he’s-my-boyfriend person that you choked out a guy and had to be bodily dragged off of him didn’t sound too great. “I might have overreacted, slightly,” he finally said. “You aren’t welcome back there, anyway. Sorry.” He at least felt guilty about it, although it didn’t sound like she had too great a relationship with him anyway so maybe it wasn’t too big a loss.
He finally found the car and got in, automatically leaning down to adjust the seat before remembering, right. Car that this body normally drove. Didn’t have to adjust for his height. Right. “Do you, uh. Anyone need anything? Since I’m out and all.”
“Maker’s breath, Nasir,” was Max’s exasperated-yet-fond response. Not at the ‘overreaction’ and apparently getting Carolina kicked out of a gym, but that his boyfriend ???! was about to get into a car and attempt to give himself a lesson without orange driver’s ed cones. In a car that wasn’t his, mind you, while stuck in a body that wasn’t his own. “Just stay there, we’re coming right now - please don’t drive like an old lady with the parking brake on, on the freeway.”
He wouldn’t hang up the phone either - no, he’d stay on, probably until they got there. The talk about terms and boyfriends (and candles) could definitely wait.
Those magically lit candles snuffed out, and Max now dressed (Carolina-in-Nasir’s body seemingly having found the right clothes too), he grabbed his car keys and headed for the garage. “Saul’s Boxing, Huntington Beach,” he repeated. “We might have to send Saul an apologetic fruit basket after this. And I’m not really sure how to change it back either. It might just be...one of those Orange County things.” They’d check the network and see what was happening - couldn’t just be those two, right?
Carolina caught the driving comment and scowled. She had assumed he knew how to drive, but if he was more likely to get into an accident than keep her car in one piece and undamaged, she really hoped that Nasir followed Max’s advice and just stayed in one place. Running a hand through the unfamiliar hair, she looked around for a hair tie, or at least a pen. Perhaps it was all the years in the military, but she really was not fond of having her hair loose about her shoulders, even if they weren’t her shoulders. Unfortunately, she could not find anything before Max grabbed his keys.
Carolina followed close behind Max out to the garage. There was no way that she was going to stay in a strange house in a strange body while this man went and picked up her body. “Orange County things?” She asked as she awkwardly got into the passenger side of the car. She had heard about these sorts of things from Wash, but she had been in the OC for nearly two months without actually experiencing anything strange.
Wait, was this guy on the Network? Is that why she ended up switched with his boyfriend? Carolina searched her memory again. Something about his words were familiar. Max. Therapist. Anaheim. The pieces finally clicked together. “Are you Max Trevelyan? The man from RivenHell?”
“That would be me, yes. Sorry - I should have added that at first, but I was kind of...” Frazzled? Weirded out? Being choked? Something like that. “But I know we’ve chatted before.” And he remembered Carolina - you didn’t forget a name like that, or the fact that she dreamed of space marines.
He kept the phone on speaker during the trip, so they could make sure that Nasir didn’t decide to actually go anywhere - perhaps he was stubborn enough to do it, but it was just a bad idea all around. Later, when he was back in his own body, Max would give him driving lessons. And let him practice in a parking lot first or something, rather than get run over by a truck on the freeway.
Then, there came the sign for the gym, he parked near where Carolina’s car was and got out. “Okay, this is...well, now what?” Perhaps letting the two who had swapped figure out where they wanted to go was best. Max was in his own body, he was kind of a neutral party here.
Nasir was leaning against the car, phone in hand so he could hear their conversation and not pouting, mostly because apparently this body was not aware that it could pout, but also because he was an adult and didn’t pout. He was a little pissed off though. “I could’ve figured it out,” he mumbled when the other two got out. It wouldn’t have been pretty but he could’ve done it.
All he wanted to do was wrap his arms around Max and melt against him and allow himself to be comforted, but this wasn’t his body and he didn’t want to do that in front of the person who usually resided in it. It seemed a little rude. Instead he crossed his arms, realized that it was a little bit more difficult than usual given the boobs, uncrossed them, put them behind his back (which just thrust his chest out, goddammit) and finally settled on hunching over with his hands in his pockets. “We, uh. Well.” He looked to Carolina, in his own body and - “Fuck me, this is weird,” he groaned. “Fucking Orange County. This is your first experience with how fun it can be to live here, right?” he asked Carolina. “Congratulations.”
Carolina might be called many things, but she did apologize when there was a reason to do so. Pinning an innocent man to a bed and demanding answers definitely counted as a reason. "Sorry about that, by the way." She was not entirely sure how her strength translated into this body, but she doubted she had done any lasting damage to the man’s throat.
When they arrived, Carolina exited the car and stared for a moment at the surreal scene before her. It was like watching a home movie of herself leaning against her car, except she had gotten sucked into the movie. Hopefully the movie would not turn into a horror flick.
“No offense, but I’d rather you not get into an accident in my car, or my body.” She could not help but be embarrassed for herself as Nasir could not seem to cross her arms properly. Oh Jesus Christ. It was hard not to facepalm at the awkward movements. ‘Now what’, indeed.
“Thanks, but I really could have done without the ‘fun’ tonight.” Carolina looked over her body. She did not look hurt. Huh. It seemed Nasir could at least hold his own long enough to get out of the ring. Or at least to get thrown out. “If you have no idea how to switch us back,” She looked at Max and then back at Nasir. “Then I guess we’re going to be stuck like this until we can find someone who can.”
She did not relish the idea of staying in Nasir’s body for who knows how long, but it also did not look like she had much of a choice. God, she needed a drink. “Which means we need some ground rules, considering I highly doubt either of us want to pretend to be the other unless absolutely necessary.” Carolina could not help but give a small smirk at that. No matter who she looked like, she highly doubted Max would let her anywhere near his bed in the foreseeable future.
Well, no, it wasn't Nasir in that body so therefore it seemed kind of skeezy to sleep with him in the same bed, pretending that it was him. It was also skeezy to make out with the correct person while they were trapped within the incorrect body - probably best to just not do any touching until this got righted. Still, he wasn't a cold person, Max was tactile - he put his arm around Nasirolina's dainty waist, comfortingly, and that was safe. He wasn't copping a feel that way, or doing anything to get him punched.
And he also forgave her for the...reaction. It was honestly understandable. Might have been more worrisome if she didn't react at all.
"You two could probably get away with posing as each other?” he suggested. “At least for a little while. Unless you wanted to use sick days for everything, but who knows how long this will last."
Maker, let it not be more than a couple of days. A week would just be cruel.
“As for ground rules, probably so. What else besides getting arrested, sex, and tattoos would you want to forbid?” Trevelyan had to think about that for a second. Let’s just say if it was his body being borrowed, those would be the top three forbidden zones.
Nasir glared at Carolina - and that was weird, glaring at yourself - for her comment, but visibly relaxed as Max wrapped an arm around him, leaning into his side with a sigh. That was a little better. Still weird, but a little more tolerable now.
He snorted at the suggestion. “I’m not so sure that would work out. Other than apparently liking to punch things, I’m not so sure we have much in common. We’d get a few hours, maybe, before people figured something was up.” But it was true - they couldn’t just put their lives on hold for what could be weeks at a time. Nasir had finals coming up. He was sure there were contingencies for these types of things since they seemed to happen so often.
“Fuck, you mean I can’t get a back alley tattoo for her?” Nasir heaved a put upon sigh. “I don’t guarantee the not getting arrested part but I’ll do my best. That sounds about right for me - just make sure to feed me at some point, I guess?”
A thought occurred to him: “Did anyone check the network? If this isn’t isolated to just us, then maybe someone else knows more about it?”
Carolina could not help but bristle as she watched Max place an arm around her waist. Even though she knew it was Nasir relaxing into the touch, (Do I really look like that? Like I’m melting into someone?), it was still very weird to witness. Still, as uncomfortable as she was with the scene, she kept her mouth shut and her hands at her sides. It was not either of their faults that she was not in her own body and she could hardly blame Max for wanting to comfort his boyfriend-turned-girlfriend. She would probably have done the same if their roles were reversed. That did not mean she had to like it, though.
She scowled at Nasir’s comment about tattoos. “No tattoos. No piercings. No messing with the hair. Most of all, if you get into a fight, you had damn well better win.” Carolina was used to the cuts and bruises sparring caused, so she was not too worried about black eyes or sore muscles. As long as it was the right kind of sore, she could work through them once she got her body back. Please let me get it back soon.
“I don’t care if you get arrested as long as you can make bail and it isn’t for something that will stick.” Carolina crossed her arms easily across the flat, muscular chest. Partly to prove a point and partly to see if Nasir’s temper would flare. “You don’t have to worry about going into work as me; I’ll call my boss in the morning.” She doubted Shepard would mind her working in a different body for a while. In these kinds of situations it really did help to work for someone on the Network.
“I haven’t checked the network because I did not seem to have my phone.” She tried to look and see where her things had gone. “But that sounds like a great place to start.”
Nasir did have a bit of a temper, but Max would hold him (her?) back - they didn’t need a fight right now, of all things. He focused on the current topic, which was the network. “Maybe switch phones now,” he suggested, because at least they could keep their own electronics? And maybe Carolina’s boss wouldn’t mind her going to work in a different body (well, that was sweet) but if she had to take a final as Nasir, then Trevelyan really hoped she would - unless he could arrange for it to be a take-home test, or remote, or something. It seemed a shame to throw all that work for the semester down the drain because the OC was quirky.
But he’d let them figure that out - she didn’t seem so awful of a person as to let someone else fail on purpose.
“I haven’t checked either, but...” Max had his own phone with him, and he pulled it free from his back pocket to scroll through the network. It was really an ungodly hour , so he wasn’t expecting much. But apparently when you were body swapped, that made you an early riser too. “You two aren’t the only ones, if it helps.”
Temper? That was putting it mildly. “I can hold my own,” Nasir snapped, having to resist the urge to say more. He clenched his jaw and tightened his fists, but held his tongue. And the sudden urge to kick his own ass. Instead he pulled out her phone and handed it over, hand held out for his own.
Nasir wasn’t thinking about finals, wasn’t thinking about much elsehow fucked up this was, and getting back home and going to bed. Maybe this was a bad dream, or it would be over in the morning. He doubted it, but hey, he could hope. Seemed to be doing a lot of that lately.
“It doesn’t,” Nasir grumbled, leaning his head against Max’s shoulder. “Maybe it does. Fuck.” At least it wasn’t just them? That was...something.
“Good.” Nasirolina had at least managed to get out of the spar without (much?) injury, so she likely had nothing to worry about on that end. Considering she was also known for her temper, Carolina doubted the casual acquaintance would notice the difference. She had taken her revenge for the tattoo comment and she had to admit she was a bit impressed that he had been able to hold himself back. It would have been surreal fighting herself, but at the same time, it might have been a bit fun.
She took her phone and nodded at Max. “He still has your phone.” Carolina looked for her other things. “Now that you have my number, you can let me know if ‘you’ are supposed to be somewhere that you can’t call out of.” She would not mind (much) taking a final for Nasir, given at least a bit of study time, but as of right now she had no idea the man was even a student. It had been a decade since she had graduated from the Academy, so everyone in their early 20s had somehow started to look entirely too young to her.
“I’ll make sure to feed you and return you in one piece, since that’s what you asked. If this doesn’t end in a few days, we’ll probably have to make a few other arrangements.” More for Nasir than for her. After all, Wash had warned her about the craziness in the O.C. She doubted her being a different person for a while was going to faze him much.
Carolina began stretching the muscles in her new neck. She had been looking for a fight earlier that morning and now she had the perfect excuse to pull not just that ass Saul into it, but his prized fighter too. Besides, she really did not want to be around to see her own body cuddling into the therapist from RivenHell. It was just weird. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have my own honor to defend.”
Andraste’s tits, these two. At least they both seemed to enjoy punching things as a means of stress relief, they could find common ground there. “Alright, I think we’re set then,” Max noted - and they’d cross any ‘what the fuck do we do if this lasts more than a few days’ bridges later. Hopefully it wouldn’t, but he had a feeling that Orange County’s strange mojo didn’t play by any specific rules.
“Call if you need anything?” he told Carolina, making sure she had her car keys and her own cell phone. She’d just have to drive looking...different. “I have a talk to give in a few hours, at a high school, but I should be around the rest of the weekend for any other emergencies.”
He squeezed the ivory white hand he was now holding. So odd. “Ready? You could probably do with some more sleep.” They all could.
Nasir turned to Max to find his phone - if they’d managed to go uninterrupted this long, it probably meant that his friends were unaffected, but he just wanted to be sure. No new notifications, good. He stuck it into his pocket.
“No hospital trips,” Nasir reminded Carolina as she headed off. That would be just what he needed, something broken when he got back to his own body. He rubbed at his temples, feeling a headache coming on, and squeezed Max’s hand. “I could,” he said, turning to give him something like a smile. “And you need to get back to bed. You have to deal with teenagers tomorrow, you need all the rest you can get. Let’s go home.”