Judy Hopps (fluffy_cop) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-04-03 18:47:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, elsa of arendelle, judy hopps |
Who: Elsa & Judy
What: A dip in the ocean
When: Wednesday
Where: The beach
Rating: Low
Status: Complete!
Judy had been in such a whirlwind of getting use to her new department, that she felt like she never had time to herself. She was working 16 hour days, four days a week so her days off felt like nothing but sleep and coffee, sleep and coffee. She decided it was time to break that cycle and do something different. Things seemed to be relatively “normal” in the area so far and she thought a trip to the beach would be nice. It was a tad chillier than normal, but that meant less people and more open space for her. With her latest dream, it felt like it would be nice to be outside to herself.
She took the transit to Huntington beach and got off, taking a deep breath as the ocean air hit her. She had never smelled anything so wonderful and had always dreamed of seeing the ocean when she was a child. Living in Kansas didn’t give much opportunity to see a never ending spanse of water.
As soon as her feet hit the sand, she kicked off her shoes and wiggled her toes into it. Even with all the weirdness, Judy couldn’t imagine living somewhere else again. This had to be paradise.
She found a spot to sit, spreading a blanket out and kicking back, looking out at the waves as they crashed against the sand.
Something had possessed Elsa this morning. A need to do something, get out of the house, put all her personal issues aside. To let it go, as it were, and maybe test out a few things.
Since she didn't think anyone would be at the beach, she got there early. The water was chilly, but didn't bother her. Using her powers, she turned her clothing into a shimmering, glittery two-piece swimsuit, and dove into the water, speeding herself along. She even created an ice-surfboard, and started to surf.
At first, Judy wasn’t sure what it was she was seeing. She blinked, holding a hand up to shade her eyes as she glanced out at the waves. She was sure she had seen someone...but that would be crazy, who would be out in the water?
She leaned to the side and then saw it, someone that was...surfing? In a bikini? Judy couldn’t believe it and she laughed, shaking her head. Hey, to each their own, she figured. She pushed herself up, brushing her hands off and started to walk towards the surf. The swimmer seemed to have everything under control, but Judy wanted to be sure they weren’t in any trouble.
After a few attempts, mostly failed, Elsa emerged from the water laughing. She wasn't a very good surfer, but maybe with some practice. Pushing her hair out of her face, she was surprised to see someone watching and promptly turned scarlet. "Uhm...hello?"
Caught red handed. Judy blushed as well, giving her an awkward wave. “Hi. I uh...was just making sure you were alright. I mean...it was just a bit strange that you were swimming in the ocean with it being so cold. I mean, totally cool! But yeah...just wanted to make sure you weren’t in need of assistance or anything like that.” Judy averted her eyes as she realized the girl was wearing...well, not much.
“But it seems you’re doing alright! Just...don’t stay in too long, yeah? Wouldn’t want to get a cold!”
“The cold doesn’t bother me,” Elsa said, tossing her hair back over her shoulder. She couldn’t very well use her magic around a stranger to dry off. What would she think or say?
“And it’s not that cold.” She folded her arms over her chest to hide the evidence.
Judy couldn’t help but glance back and raise an eyebrow at her stance. “Not too cold?” she asked. At least there wasn’t a high wind that day. She nodded her head back to her blanket. “I have an extra towel if you need one.”
“Thank you, I’d appreciate it.” Elsa walked over. She didn’t want to put Judy out but she wanted to cover up now that she had an audience. “What brings you to the beach?”
“Fresh air and the thought that it wouldn’t be so busy. I didn’t think I would see someone splashing around in the water!” Judy took the lead and headed back towards her area. “You must be very cold blooded to stand the water!” She glanced at the woman and gave her a bashful smile. “In a literal sense of course.”
“It’s a little cold for swimming.” Elsa sounded like she was well aware of that fact, and her cheeks remained just a little flushed. She was grateful when they started moving, taking the opportunity to flick her wrist, sweeping the water in her hair and on her body onto the sand. “But I’m not usually bothered by it. I’m uhm. From Norway.”
Judy glanced back at her as she repeated what she had said, but gave a shrug of her shoulders. “It is, but it seems you actually dry off fairly quickly.” At least it looked like she was much drier now...almost completely dry. Still, Judy handed her a towel when they got to her area, nodding her head towards the blanket to invite her to sit down as well.
“Is Norway the place people will sit in those warm hot springs, while there’s snow all around them?”
“I think that’s Russia. Maybe Alaska.” Elsa flashed her a nervous smile. “And I technically I’m not from Norway but my family is, originally?”
She wrapped the towel around her body, then took a seat next to Judy.
“Right, right,” she said, her head nodding as she felt a bit foolish as meshing all cold countries together...at least she thought Norway was a cold country…
“So you’ve got the genes that handle cold weather.” Judy nodded her head again as if she had uncovered the truth to Elsa’s choice of taking a dip. “I heard swimming in the cold is actually good for your heart.” She glanced at her companion as if she knew that to be true as well.
“Yes! Exactly.” Elsa nodded. “I’ve got… good genes.” In her dreams she’d been born with that kind of magic, so did that count then? She supposed it had to.
“I’ve never heard that, but I don’t see why it couldn’t be possible?”
Judy nodded her head, drawing a circle in the sand next to her. “Yeah, I guess it has to do something with getting your heart pumping or something like that.” Really, Judy should pay more attention to health things, but it just seemed to slip her mind.
“Have you been in this area for long?” Maybe she grew up in warm weather and wanted to experience something cold.
“I grew up here, but I’ve only been back a few months.” Maybe it was longer, Elsa lost track of times. “Or maybe closer to six months. I was in London getting my degree for the past seven years.”
“Really?” Judy’s ears pricked up as the conversation turned towards travel. “That sounds like a lot of fun! What degree were you working on?” Moving to California had been the biggest amount of space Judy had ever traveled, but she hoped to travel the world someday. There was so much more to see!
“Structural engineering.” Elsa pulled her legs up and wrapped her arms around her knees. “And architecture. I’m designing the new L-Corp building. It’s going to be beautiful. What better way to be immortal than to build something that’ll last forever?”
“Wow, that’s amazing! Did you always know that’s what you wanted to do?” Judy copied how Elsa was sitting, resting her chin on her knees to look at her companion. “And I can only imagine the kind of buildings you were able to see in London!”
“Some really beautiful ones. But I’m hoping my own style is distinctive.” L-Corp should be the next big and new thing. Maybe she’d end up designing more buildings. A far cry from being Queen.
“When I was three I was obsessed with building blocks, that never changed.” Absently, and before she could catch herself, Elsa twirled her finger, making the model of a building out of ice.
Judy could understand the want and need to prove yourself, to show your own unique style when it came to your career. She had opened her mouth to agree when her attention was drawn to the small building of ice that seemed to appear out of nowhere. Her mouth remained open, looking down at the building. It was beautiful and, if it was demonstrating just a taste of what Elsa could design, it was impressive.
But more impressive and more confusing was how she made it. Judy pointed at it, glancing at her blanket companion. “How’d you do that?”
Elsa darted her eyes, but it was too late to hide it now. Judy had clearly seen her use her magic. “Magic. Literally. I was born with it. I mean, I’ve had dreams where I was born with it. I know that sounds insane.”
If Judy hadn’t started her own dreams and been on the network, it would have seem a bit crazy to her, but instead, she kind of just blinked, thinking how this was the first time she had actually seen things from the dreams. Part of her kind of accepted what the dreams were; how could she argue when she had them herself? But she still found stories of powers and receiving things from the dreams...well, hard to believe. But it seemed to come as second nature to Elsa, as if she really had been born with it.
“So...you dreamt about being born with the dreams and you started to be able to do the same here?” She tried to make her tone sound genuinely curious, but not overly so to make her new friend feel uncomfortable. She wondered if this girl had to have many conversations about this before, but she couldn’t help but want to know more about it. She glanced up at her. “Is that why you were swimming in the ocean? The cold literally doesn’t bother you?”
“Yes,” Elsa replied. “It’s… I’m sort of insulated against it.”
The summer might be nice too, since she could basically be an air conditioner. “You’re not afraid?”
Judy shook her head. “Afraid? I wouldn’t say afraid. Interested maybe? I’m kind of new to this whole dream thing and I haven’t had any of my dreams impact my actual life. But I’ve heard people tell the craziest things on the network! So, it’s interesting to see it in person.” She nodded to the building that was still standing. “How long was it you were dreaming until it developed here?”
“A month or so. It wasn’t very strong at first and I couldn’t control it at all. More than once I woke up with my bedroom covered in ice.” Elsa smiled. “It’s just..for awhile I was afraid, and I’d hurt people I loved with these powers.”
Judy’s eyes widened at what Elsa had gone through and shook her head. “I can’t imagine going through something like that. Caught unawares and worried! Were you cold then or you found that you were use to the temperatures already?” Judy couldn’t help but have a million questions on her mind; she didn’t want to make Elsa feel uncomfortable with them, but she seemed to be open to talking about it.
Judy really just wanted to try and find out if she would wake up as a bunny one day.
“The first few times I was really, really cold.” Elsa shivered at the memory, but she was relaxing more and more around Judy. She didn’t know her, but she felt trustworthy. “A lot of my control came when I learned how in my dreams.”
“Seems like the dreams actually helped out this time! I’ve only heard bad things about dreams on the network...or just a lot of dark stuff.” She shook her head, sad that there were so many in this area that struggled with their dreams and what they meant, how they made them feel. “I’m happy you were able to find a way to control something like that! I can imagine how overwhelming it must have been at the beginning.” She grinned at her friend.
“I’m Judy by the way.” She dusted her hand off to hold out to her.
“They can be really dark,” Elsa said, thinking of her own. Of hurting Anna, of threatening her people. She’d briefly considering taking her own life but had worried that the storm would have gone on without her. It wasn’t something she particularly talked about. To anyone.
“But there are still good things from them.”
“Oh?” It was very few and far between that Judy had heard any good things about the dreams; the whole network seemed to be filled with gloom and doom, but every now and then a white light seemed to come through and Judy was happy to see that there would always be something good to celebrate.
“What have been the best parts of your dreams?”
“Reconnecting with my sister, and letting go of my fears and my self-doubt.” Some of that still existed, how could it not? But she was in a lot better place than before she’d dreamed, and definitely better than the darkest moments of her dreams. “Hiding who you are inside is never fun.”
Judy couldn’t help but grin at that last part and she nodded her head, squinting as she looked at Elsa. “Never fun and unfortunate when it has to happen. It just feels stifling.” She turned her attention back to the waves in front of them. “Do you find a lot of similarities between your dreams and here? Like...you’re learning this as you dream it?”
“A little bit. I still hurt her when we were kids. It was an accident, but still. I still drifted away. I didn’t move away in my dreams though, I was always there, just distant. In hindsight, it wasn’t fare to her, or me.” Elsa leaned back on her hand, stretching her legs out. “I blame my father for some of that.”
It was a lot more honest than Judy would have thought she would feel comfortable with. Still, she didn’t want to stop her or cut her short; sometimes people just needed to talk when the mood was right. Judy listened, her heart going out to her. She knew what it was like to have younger siblings and the thought of hurting them, whether indirect or direct, was hard.
“Why do you blame your father?” she asked, the question slipping past her before she could catch it. She blushed, giving Elsa an apologetic look. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pry…”
Rubbing her hand on her knee, Elsa shrugged. “It’s easier to see from a distance, and I know he meant well, but I don’t think he handled everything very well. He told me to conceal, to not feel. To hold everything in out of fear it would come out and all that did was make it build up over the years, so I never knew how to control my powers.”
He wasn’t as bad as in the dreams, but he had blamed her.
Judy frowned at that, surprised to hear something kind of familiar to her own. It wasn’t about feeling, but the same aspect of not being true to yourself, to not take the risk. “I’m sorry to hear he did that,” she said. “It’s hard to hear your parents tell you to be something that you can’t help but be!” She gave her a reassuring smile. “I’m sure you’re like me and you look back on it and realize they were just trying to protect you, but I wish they could have done it in a different way.” She glanced down at her hands before shrugging.
“Hard lessons to learn! At least we come to them now so if we have kids of our own we know what NOT to do!” She grinned. “I’ve gotta be heading back, but it was nice to stop and talk with ya. Get to know more about the dreams and such.” She stood and grinned. “Always good to meet someone from online, someone that understands the whole dream thing.”
“Yes, it’s exactly that.” Elsa thought that if she’d been taught to control her feelings instead of repress them, she would have had an easier time of it. And so would everyone else.
She smiled at Judy, “It was nice to meet you.”