sixthiterationlogs | i've fallen out of favour and i've fallen from grace

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i've fallen out of favour and i've fallen from grace

WHO: Jean Grey
WHERE: The fountain, the village roads
WHEN: 2 December
OPEN TO: All
WARNINGS: Jean is a telepath - her powers are diminished but she can feel strong emotions and loud thoughts/surface thoughts. If there's something you would like her to pick up in specific, let me know on Plurk. She also has the ice power, so as she's coming out of the fountain she is freezing things around her. This isn't normally what happens in the fountain and she's not freezing over the surface of the fountain itself, just the lip of it.
STATUS: Open to new threads.

Everything was black. It was black and cold, bone chillingly cold, and Jean couldn't understand why she felt like she was being pushed upward through a passage when she'd just been in Egypt where the heat was dry and hot. None of it made sense, really, but did anything make sense lately? There were people out to kill them because they were mutants, there were mutants out to kill them because they weren't the right kind of mutants. Down was up and up was down and she was currently swimming in an abyss she didn't recognize.

She reached out with her mind first. Charles had always said that her mind was her greatest gift and her finest asset and not feeling him, not feeling that familiar answer back shook her to the core; had he died? He'd been there. He'd told her to unleash her full power, to fight back, to be everything she was capable of and to stop restraining herself from fear in order to save them all. Why wasn't he answering? She tried again, harder, and then out loud. Surely he'd hear her if he screamed, wouldn't he, even if he couldn't hear her in his head?

"Charles!" she screamed, choking down water in exchange for her troubles. She scrabbled up through the water and bumped up against what felt like solid rock and then, only then, did she chance opening her eyes. It was a fountain, similar to a fountain at a school or a museum, and she had no idea why she'd be half-drowning in a fountain with snow on the ground when she'd just been in Egypt with hot, dry air swirling around her and searing her lungs.

"Charles! Professor! Charles, please!" she screamed again, fingers slipping on the edge of the fountain. She kept trying to clear the snow away but there was more and more, almost as if her efforts to get rid of it were multiplying it instead. What was happening? How was this happening? She'd always been a telepath, had always had this ability and this gift? How was she suddenly locked away from hearing anything but a low, faint buzz and making snow pile up beneath her fingertips?

"Answer me! Someone! Anyone!?"

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One of the downsides to Ren's insistence in keeping an eye on the source of all new 'arrivals' to the town was his penchant for ending up near or at the fountain whenever someone decided to come sputtering to the surface like a half drowned womp rat.

More often than not he observed and let someone else play the roll of welcome wagon. The choking shouts, however, drew him in this time. He was out in the cold too much and too often, but his numbing fingers grabbed her wrist where she struggled, and he helped to pull her out of the fountain, a dark black contrast of clothing against the white of the snow.

"Shouting in the water is a good way to drown yourself. Or attract hungry animals." Her screaming had been hard on his ears and there was a rough and slightly irritated tone to his voice, but he was not rough in his grip, only firm.

"There's an inn down this path. If you want answers, you can ask for them inside. Not that anyone will have them for you." A touch of bitter tipped his last few words and his thoughts mirrored it, irritated tendrils reflecting on his own need for answers and loss of power.

"Can you walk better than you swim?"

Jean felt the irritation on him, the frustration and she also felt a little something else that made her think that he might be like her. He might be a mutant and, more than that, he might also be a telepath. She decided to test it a little and just push, thinking her name as loudly as she could. If it didn't work, maybe he'd just think she was giving him a blank stare or something but if it did work, she would have a direction to go in.

Come on. I'm Jean Grey. I'm just like you. I'M JEAN ELAINE GREY. I'M JUST LIKE YOU.

One of the first things she'd learned about controlling her powers had been toning down how she 'sounded' to other telepaths, had been working on building up walls in her mind to keep errant thoughts from drifting in or out. She let all that go for a moment and decided to just leave her mind open; if this didn't work, she had truly lost everything about her that made her a mutant and the Professor's protege.

Having another voice in his mind was not unfamiliar for Ren. In fact, it was an all too familiar feeling with both positive and negative connections, and one that made his mind abruptly lock down like a clamp on his thoughts. He took a step back once she was out of the water, his guard up and his posture tense. He had walls of his own, even if his own abilities were not quite the same as hers.

He pushed back, and followed the connection to her mind, as narrow and closed as it might now be. Was she a Jedi or just a force user? Her wild throw of her name and thought was both strong and almost desperate, and he leaned more toward another awakening in the force that he had missed somehow with his faded connection.

My name is Kylo Ren. At least with their connection he could try to get a sense of whether or not she responded to his name. His tie to the force had weakened so much, but he would hold onto his control and his memories as tightly as he could with every last ounce of his strength and that fierce determination was there at the front of his mind.

How awkward it would be for any who might see them as they stood face to face without a word between them. Only an intense staring contest in the cold snow.

There's screaming coming from the fountain. It's enough that Peggy forgets her coat as she bursts from her home in order to get to the fountain, feeling like she's been drawn there somehow, and when she arrives, there's a girl pleading for help. "Hold on, just a moment," she promises, reaching in and hissing when the frost burns at her hands. It's the only hesitation she has before she plunges both hands in despite the pain in order to hook her elbows underneath the girl's armpits, planting her heel against the base of the fountain to gain some leverage, at which point she bears down in order to haul her out.

"Just a little further," she coaxes. "You'll be out in just a moment."

It took so much more concentration than she was used to but when she heard him back in her head, Jean sighed in relief. She hadn't exchanged her powers for something else and she still had what made her her; it seemed she was still a telepath in spite of all of it. It was hard to concentrate, yes, but she was also freezing cold in a strange place and she'd just exhausted herself trying to swim out of a fountain. Maybe it would come back with some rest.

Jean focused for a moment and found her center, found her calm. It took a lot of doing because she was shivering cold and in a strange place but at least this was another mutant who could do the same thing she could do. That was a start.

Where are we, Kylo?

The woman's voice was soothing and Jean used it as her focus and her beacon as she finally pulled herself out of the fountain and collapsed onto the ground beside it. Everything she touched sent out fractals of ice, whirling patterns on the ground, and she couldn't understand it; she'd never been a cryokinetic. Was this a secondary mutation? Was this what the professor had meant about unleashing her powers and not being afraid?

Jean thought it meant fire, meant unleashing the darkness that she dreamed about and that tormented her night and day. She had no idea that darkness was apparently ice. Still, judging by the way snow and ice kept flurrying from her fingertips, it must have been that instead. She coughed a little more before looking at the woman's face.

"I'm sorry, I don't know...I don't know where I am."

It was odd to be having a mental conversation. Ren was so used to these things being one sided, and after his encounter with Rey he was wary of letting her into his head too far. Especially given his weakened state. The potential of another force user was too tantalizing a possibility, though. He couldn't resist, and there was hardly a point in stopping now that he had begun.

Perhaps she would unknowingly have the answers he sought.

But she was soaked and the snow was thick. He pulled off his coat, something he had now done for others more in the last month than in his entire life, and offered it to the shivering young woman before him. H was more tolerant of the cold than some, though by no means immune to it. She had his interest and he needed to keep her alive.

A deserted village in a canyon. Far from anyone or anything you know. It has no name. His irritation had shifted to determination and something he refused to acknowledge as hope. You will die out here in the snow if we do not move. Come with me. He held out his other hand to her, watching her expectantly, waiting for her to take the coat and his hand and let him lead her inside to the warmth of a fire and the shelter of walls against the biting cold in the air.

"It's all right," she says, trying to soothe the girl as she works to get her out, shivering a little as the cold seems to get progressively worse with the more that she touches her. Once she has her out of the cold, she pushes her hands into her pockets to try and warm up, staring at the way that snow and ice seem to have been building up around the fountain.

"I'm Peggy Carter," she introduces herself, "and you've found yourself in a little village that may or may not be in the past," she says. "You're freezing," she says. "We should warm you up, as quickly as we can."

Jean slid into the coat, grateful for the warmth of it even though she knew she wouldn't be truly warm until she got inside and out of her wet clothes. She had no idea what happened to her flight suit or any of the others she'd been with; any attempts to find their minds in the mass around her was futile. All she could tune in on was Kylo, really, and only because he was close. Everything else was a buzz, static like from a radio out of range, and no matter what she did she couldn't tune the dial.

She slid her hand into his and squeezed it tight, her thoughts sending out a brief thanks as she started to walk. Moving made her feel warmer, at least, and she managed to force a smile.

"Sorry about...back there," she said, after they'd walked a little. "I just wasn't expecting to be there."

"Je--Jean Grey," she managed, teeth chattering with the cold. It was impossibly cold here and the snow and ice seemed to be getting worse by the minute. If she didn't get indoors and into dry clothes, Jean was certain that she'd end up with frostbite or worse; hopefully Peggy could help her with that.

"Sorry, I don't know how I got here. I don't know what happened." It had been Egypt and the searing desert, burning hot, and now it was this icy place. Something had happened between now and then...had Kurt teleported her? But he couldn't teleport someone to a place he couldn't see, could he?

"No one ever is. It's where whoever trapped us here likes to deposit their prisoners." Not exactly the phrasing or tact needed to set someone at ease, but Ren didn't believe in doing that to begin with. Anyone who let their guard down was a fool for doing so.

It's odd to be leading someone to the inn in the way he was. He didn't exactly return Jean's smile, but Ren wasn't antagonistic, and even seemed to have found something worth holding his attention and putting actual effort into. He was trying to be friendly, even if he failed at reassuring. If she was a force user, the two of them could try and work together. Maybe then he could get in contact with Snoke and find out why no one had come for him. Had his master moved on to someone else after Ren's failures? Maybe he had proven too weak to be useful. If his loss of so much of his power was anything to go by, that was likely a part of it.

"Most of this place is empty of answers. I will try to help you where I can." The offer is genuine. Ren wanted another force user like him. He needed that familiarity, and he wanted someone to train, or at least to understand. He failed to convince Rey. Maybe he had pushed too strongly or gotten to her too late. But this young woman could be different.

"No, you wouldn't," Peggy replies, trying her best to be gentle about the news she's about to deliver. She's shivering terribly now, trying to coax them onwards to the inn where she knows a fire will at least chase some of this cold away. "I don't understand, the fountain hadn't been that icy the last I'd seen it." Still, the cold can wait until later given that she's more concerned with the fact that they're both likely to freeze to death if they don't get inside soon. "It's lovely to meet you, Miss Grey," is her greeting, trying to coax her towards the inn.

"I promise, you'll feel much better soon," she guarantees, not sure if she's speaking for herself or if she's speaking for the girl.

"I appreciate the help," Jean said, nodding once to confirm her understanding that this place was apparently one where answers weren't forthcoming and readily available. Things had mostly come easily to her over the course of her life. Sure, it was difficult to be a mutant and she felt isolated from her peers due to the nature and degree of her abilities but this was something else entirely.

Jean had never felt out of control before, had never felt like she had no plan and no direction to go in. She usually had the professor as a touchstone and the school to guide her; here in this place, she would have neither. Kylo, at least, was someone who shared abilities with her and could understand her gifts. This was something to be respected.

"I guess it would be stupid to ask if anyone knows a way out, wouldn't it? Since you would have already taken it if you did? I have to ask even if I know you're probably going to say no."

"It's good to meet you too. I wish it could have been under bet-ter circumstances," Jean stammered, still chilled to the bone from the bitter cold. The sooner she got inside, the better. She'd grown up in New York, upstate, and she knew about winter but she'd always had a coat and warm clothing then. She'd never fallen into a fountain and soaked through her clothes while wearing hardly anything.

"Sorry, I'll be glad to get warm," she said. She didn't know if it warranted an apology, given the circumstances, but she gave it anyway.

"It would but we all do it and no one with a mind should listen when someone else tells them there isn't." Ren certainly didn't believe it. And even if he spent the next five years searching he wouldn't believe it. He couldn't afford to accept that as a possibility.

He never stops moving while they talk, wanting to get her inside quickly. He didn't need people here at odds with him because he let someone freeze to death, and in his head he reasoned that was what put urgency to his step and nothing else.

"The snow and ice make it difficult to get far from the village, and even more difficult to try and scale the canyon. If the weather doesn't change it will take some work to get together the tools necessary, but I've been told it isn't always snowing here." And not killing himself trying to get out was preferable to facing the rocky walls of their prison for now.

"You will have dry clothes you can change into in the pack on your back."

"Honestly, I don't know when good circumstances will kick in," she apologizes to Jean, because the truth is that Peggy is still under the belief that things are just one unfortunate situation to the next, leaving her to wonder how on earth they're going to be able to get through it. "It's not normally this cold, though," she admits, still pushing forward. "Maybe you've come on the cusp of a storm," she remarks, thinking logically.

It's easier than recalling how the snow and ice had seemed to build around Jean and how cold she'd been at the touch.

Jean had noticed the pack and carried it with her, though she hadn't thought much about it until he said something now. Still, it was a comfort to know she had something dry and warm to change into as soon as she could get indoors; she wanted, very much, to be getting close.

"Is it a big place? It doesn't seem like it's very big." Looking around, it seemed deserted, but maybe that was just because it was late afternoon. Everyone had to be working, right? She would think so, anyway, and if not there were other things to ask questions about.

"It wasn't winter back home," Jean pointed out. It had been spring, actually, on the edge of summer and it had been warm in Westchester and it had been bright. It was nothing like this place. It got cold there, sure, but nothing like it was here and now. Besides, she didn't make a habit of wandering around in the snow in wet clothes back home.

"It was spring. How did the seasons change so rapidly?" Had she lost time? Was she completely missing time?

"Well, you're certainly not at home," is Peggy's first reply, tugging at the door to the inn to haul herself in, desperately trying to get towards the heat. She feels her fingers going numb and so when she puts them near to the fire, they sharply hurt. It's that pain that makes her turn to the woman, eyeing her warily, recalling how Karen had been able to create fire from her fingertips. "Are you normally so cold?" she asks, knowing that the poor girl is probably overwhelmed, but she feels like getting to the matter as quickly as possible seems to be the best plan of action.

Between the fountain, Peggy's pain, and the girls' surprise about the cold, she has to believe that something strange is afoot.

The snow has been more than a little inconvenient, to say the least. When Matt's been away from it, tucked up inside the warmth of the house or the inn, it's been easy enough to consider that this sort of trial by fire is likely good for him -- If he can manage this, getting by without his powers on a normal day should be a piece of cake, right? But when he's in the middle of it, he feels a lot less generous about having to trek blind through the drifts.

Case in point: After having nearly fallen on his ass on the front steps of the inn, he clatters into the front room, the wind knocking the door back against the wall with a bang. Snow in his hair, mouth in a line, he feels for the knob and jerks the door closed behind him.

Ren watched her while they walked with interest. She was the first person he had run into so far that he did not immediately feel some strong level of distrust toward. A few people in the village were tolerable and even useful but for the most part, Ren just wanted out.

"It's very small. A village so devoid of useful technology they may as well have dropped us on a wasteland. There is some shelter at least, if you can tolerate either lingering too close to the others to manage supplies and temperature, or the cold enough to leave. I have been trying to prepare one of the buildings to be a shelter without the traffic, but without tools at my disposal it has been a slow process." And a frustrating one. He needed more reliable means to get food and wood. He needed weapons. He needed to be able to get away from the others he was trapped with.

"There are more people here than it might seem. Some stay at the inn. Others are scattered about and come and go." He tugged the door open when they made it to the mentioned Inn, encouraging her to enter first. If nothing else, there seemed to reliably be a fire going.

Jean shook her head. Now that she was inside, everything began to warm up a little and her fingers, while still frozen to the bone, seemed to be the only thing that weren't catching up to the rest of her body. It was strange but she knew that some mutants developed a secondary mutation. What if this was hers? What if ice was her secondary mutation?

"No, I'm not. I've never experienced anything like this before." Jean crossed over toward the fire, turning her palms out toward it. As she did, the fire seemed to bend away from her hands, almost as if they were too cold to sustain the heat. How was that even possible?

The noise startled Jean for a moment but once she realized it was someone simply coming in from the cold, she relaxed a little. It was difficult to get used to the fact that her powers didn't work the way she was used to the them working. Before, she was pretty aware of people coming in and out, of all the people within the grounds of the school, even, so it was hard to be surprised even if she was distracted by something else.

It was different here. Here, she had to truly tune in to notice anyone and even still, picking out individual thoughts was hard. It took almost all of her effort and often she couldn't get anything at all. It was all right with Kylo Ren, if only because he could meet her halfway, but sometimes she got startled by someone like the man just now.

"Ah! Sorry, you startled me a little," she said, rising from her seat and giving him a little smile. "Did the storm start back up?"

Jean went inside, grateful for the warm air. It wasn't the blast of it she would have expected with modern heating but she could feel the warmth from a fire and just being out of the snow and the wet. She turned back to look at him and smiled, a genuine smile, and nodded her thanks. It was a start.

"There's no technology, then? No phones, no television, no radio?" If there was no technology, that might be a good thing. It would mean that it would be harder to track her, as a mutant, and she might be safe for a little while. Being a mutant could be a good thing, in the right places, or a dangerous one in the wrong ones. She didn't know which kind of place this was just yet but she knew that Ren, at least, was the same as she.

"This place seems to be quite the crash course in experiencing things that no one has, before," Peggy says ruefully, wrapping up her palms in dry towels and then sitting on them so that it feels comfortable. She exhales with mild relief when she starts to feel warmth come into the digits once more. "Though, I've never seen such a wintry arrival. Maybe the water is somehow supercharged," she says, grasping at straws. "Perhaps it's just that it will take longer for you to thaw?"

"Is it uncomfortable?" she wonders.

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i've fallen out of favour and i've fallen from grace

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