New York City, ESU Campus, Marvel-616. Monday Afternoon.

[icecoldfrost]

Emma was in the middle of her kickboxing class when she was just struck with the sense of - for lack of a better term - wrong. She couldn't sense anything with her powers to account for it, it was just... like a voice over an intercom where you couldn't make out the words, or a popular song with two notes out-of-tune. Or a ripple in a lake with no source. Nothing she could articulate, just...wrong. Echos of nails on a chalkboard and why couldn't she place this damned -

- Of course, the middle of kickboxing class was generally not a good place for one get hit by nebulous feelings of doom and dread, and the next thing Emma knew, she was on the floor, her sparring partner shrilly apologizing over and over, and her classmates hovering.

"Please stay down, Frost," the the cute coach was saying, even as things swam in circles around her. "You might have a concussion, and you've got a bloody nose. Can you tell me how many fingers I'm holding up?"

"Three, my name is Emma Grace Frost, I am about to turn nineteen years old next month, this is Kickboxing for Beginners, and Ellen there just nailed me on the side of the head," Emma said crossly. "That wasn't the move we were supposed to be practicing."

"But you always seem to know what I'm going to do next!" Ellen wailed, looking distraught. "I didn't think it would hurt to try something new!"

"Ellen, go get Emma some ice," the teacher sighed. "Fine, no concussion. But take it easy the rest of the day, okay? I'd skip any other classes today if I were you, and I'll give you a note in case your other professors raise a fuss."

That was perfectly fine with Emma. She was just going to hole up in her now single-room with an ice pack and a large mug of tea, and try to resist the urge to call Kerrigan or Sookie or Karla like a frightened child. She was Emma Frost, dammit. She wasn't going to go running to other people over a mild spook like this.

....start randomly texting, maybe. But at least it was something to focus on that wasn't homework, and now she could do it without worrying about a roommate catching her.

[OOC: NFB, Open for calls, texts, what-have-you.]

Comments

[bitten_notshy]

Thirty-five hundred miles away, Jack had his own feeling of doom and dread, though the cause was very different. He stood on the sidewalk across the street from what had once been the oldest and most discreet vampire salon in this bit of London and wondered why none of the other passers-by seemed to notice there was a howling black hole where the building had once stood, right between a nail parlor and a Vietnamese takeaway. He couldn't look at the space too much; it made his head hurt.

He flipped his coat collar up, turned down another block and went into a Starbucks. Once he'd gotten a mocha and felt a bit calmer, Emma got a text. Other people -- thamaturgists and such -- might have more valuable feedback. It just ... wasn't what he wanted quite yet.

Can you think of any reasons why a building would go missing?

[icecoldfrost]

demolished to make way for yet another gross mcdonalds? came the speedy text reply. but I still miss mcflurries. when are those invented? I have a craving.

Because everything was always about Emma.

[bitten_notshy]

not construction, Jack returned. emptier than that. like whole place was erased, ground included. and i've no idea. google it. oh wait, you can't.

Because Jack was not inclined to go out of his way to help Emma on strange American fast food cravings.

[icecoldfrost]

bite me mr. priest. If it was possible to glare through a text message, Emma would some how manage it. what do u mean, erased? like, razed?

[bitten_notshy]

too far away for that, unfortunately. He'd let her think about that for a moment, then: like god rubbed it off face of planet. like black hole no one else seemed to notice. will need to bring sorcerer by to see what he feels.

[icecoldfrost]

WE DO NOT POKE THE HAPPY FUN BLACK HOLE, JACK. Was he insane? Generally Jack had better survival instincts than that. SEND the sorcerer. No poking at it yourself.

[bitten_notshy]

didn't say I was going to try to jump into it, Jack sent back. Was it actually possible to pout in text message? He was giving it his best go either way.

don't worry. i'll stay well behind him. OK?

[icecoldfrost]

Sorry, Jack, your phone was going to start ringing. Emma was not going to let you off the hook with this.

[bitten_notshy]

Jack sighed -- he hadn't meant to frighten her -- but picked up the phone. "I've no intention of getting myself killed, I promise," he said. "And hello."

[icecoldfrost]

"Stay a block back and if I don't hear from you I am calling everyone from your world I know," Emma threatened. "That includes a hideously expensive portal to go pick up your sister, since she's so very handy at sleuthing you out."

[bitten_notshy]

"I'll do you better and stay on the telephone with you the whole time so you can hear my last dying shrieks if a monster jumps out to get us," Jack promised. "Why are you so worried, anyhow? It's not like you."

[icecoldfrost]

"Because I know you and your ability to sniff out trouble at a thousand paces," Emma replied, annoyed, "-and I'm not close enough to sit on you and keep your curiosity from running unchecked."

And Sebastien wasn't around to do it for her. Stupid, useless vampire.

"-And I got kicked in the head in class today and it is making me cranky about everything."

[bitten_notshy]

"Why are people kicking you in the head, Miss Frost?" Jack asked, almost sounding concerned. "The academic value of it seems limited."

He added, off-handedly, "I'll be fine. People were walking within a dozen feet and didn't even seem to notice anything was wrong. But you're right, that's never quite been my luck, has it?"

[furnaceface]

Jono hadn't even really bothered to think too hard about how he was replying to Emma's message until after he'd hit send. Texts were a force of habit, really. If he got one, he was all too happy to give one back.

Please, please don't mention X-style anything to me right now, Emma. I'm not entirely certain I can stomach it right now.

... To say the least.

[icecoldfrost]

That sounds ominously like something happened and you didn't tell Auntie Emma because you knew she'd go on the warpath and possibly vivisect a few people, Emma replied, and if it was possible for a text message to carry overtones of 'spill it, Starsmore,' this one probably did.

[furnaceface]

... Possibly that. More that I'm still working on getting my head on straight again.

Bloody hell. Where to even begin?

It's a long story. He frowned at the screen of his phone, having a bit of a moral dilemma, then. He could hold back the whole of it from her for now, but all it would take was another alumni event on the island, and she would be able to find out anything she wanted, anyhow. But timelines were so...

Bloody hell.

[icecoldfrost]

I am on bed-rest from getting dumped on the floor and cracking my brain open during kickboxing today, Emma practically drawled. I have nothing but time.

Yeah. Timelines were so not an excuse as far as she was concerned.

[furnaceface]

Jono just kind of stared at the phone for a moment, and then after a couple of failed attempts at even figuring out where to start, he gave the hell up and dialled her number.

Ring ring, Miss Frost.

Really, what better way to break the ice?

[icecoldfrost]

That was....not what Emma was expecting to happen.

"Please tell me you have another Speak 'N Spell," she said immediately upon picking up. "Because then I can record this for posterity. Somehow."

Caring friend. Really.

"Now, darling, tell Auntie Emma who she gets to tar and feather? If it's Jean, you get a cookie."

[furnaceface]

"... No, not Jean."

And no, not a Speak 'N Spell, evidentially.

"I could write you a list. Not going to, though. Not worth it."

He didn't mean to sound so damn tired. And he couldn't really help it, either.

[icecoldfrost]

Typically, one might expect a long pause as a friend digested such information.

This was Emma.

"You stupid, horrible boy," she shrieked, glaring as if he could see her. "How long have you been able to speak? Why didn't you tell me? What the HELL have you been up to, Jonothon, and so help me, I am tempted to put you on the next portal out here so I can pick your mind myself and where the hell are you anyway?"

Caring friend. Promise.

[furnaceface]

There was a bit of a pause from Jono's end, at least.

"'M in Fandom," he replied, his tone dropping to something even more tired, still. "Cable brought me here about a week ago. Which is about as long as I've been able to speak, so long as we're not counting th' half-year that I spent brainwashed, doing dirty work for the American government."

He was taking the shrieking with a grain of salt. Really, he'd called himself stupid and horrible enough lately, it wasn't like he was phased all that much, hearing it from somebody else.

[icecoldfrost]

"Cable." It was practically spat out. "How nice of him to provide a taxi." And not stop whatever they had done to Jono that made him sound so exhausted.

"Lovely to hear they're still trying to use us when they aren't trying to eradicate us. Utterly charming. Maybe I'll just start lobotomizing the racists as I run into them. See how they like genetic cleansing when it's them on the table."

[furnaceface]

"That'd just make them all th'more militant about wiping mutants out," Jono sighed, frowning as he found himself a seat in the corner of the theatre. "S'just what they need, isn't it? More reasons to hate us?"

There was a wince that followed that.

Us. Them. He'd been a hollowed-out shell of baseline human for months. And now he wasn't entirely certain what he was.

Ugly, mostly.

"Trust me. They don't need th'help."

[icecoldfrost]

"They don't need reasons, either," Emma pointed out. "Even if we were all happy fluffy puppies, they'd still hate us."