fandomtownies | The Beach, Sunday

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The Beach, Sunday

Jonothon had spent yesterday begging for quiet, and quiet hadn't come. He'd spent yesterday begging for a good many things, really. Quiet. Understanding. A nice, deep breath. Apparently none of those things were meant to be, and as much as 'burying his head under a pillow' had given him some minor placebo effect, the truth of the matter was, there were voices. They were deafening in his mind's eye. And he had no bloody clue how to escape them.

Today, he'd decided to try distance, since begging for quiet into an uncaring void hadn't seemed to work. And, to some minor degree, proximity did seem to make some difference. If he headed in one direction, the voices, the murmurs in his mind got louder, more overwhelming, like the crowd had only gotten larger still, like he was walking from a small town toward a large city.

... Which was essentially what had happened.

The other direction had made things somewhat more tolerable, the dull roar or human life shifting until it was something softer, like murmurs on the outskirts of a quiet room, and he would have kept going, except that eventually he was met with an expanse of open water set out before him, just daring him to try.

He stared at it in helpless silence for a long while, and then just took a seat right there on the beach in the snow and the rain, quietly defeated. He'd live with murmurs, then. Tolerate the cold.

He wasn't going back toward the roar.

[OOC: Open!]

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She'd read the squirrel's notes that morning, even if she'd left out most of what they said on the radio. Jon wasn't ok.

When she'd caffeinated sufficiently, she went looking for him. It wasn't difficult. She sat where she was and yelled his name in her head.

JON? YOU THERE?

Well, congratulations, Jack. You'd reached him readily enough.

His reply was a little bit of an incoherent psionic buzz of protest and no small amount of distress, but you'd reached him!

She lowered her voice.

The squirrel notes said you were signing. You can talk, you just have to think the words.

Jono's reply to that was a little more coherent, if 'actually taking a moment to think of the sound of a pathetic whimper' counted as coherent.

At least he followed that up with words.

//S'loud... s'been murmurs nonstop, please, please get out of my head, I can't-- can't take more of it.// He was grabbing the sides of his head again, balling himself up in the sand. No amount of trying to bury his head in it was going to filter out the psionic noise, though. //If you're real, if I'm not just going mad, and you want to speak, I'm on th' beach. Get out of my head.//

Jack's answer was a wordless sort of agreement. She grabbed her coat and bolted toward the beach. She wasn't sure where on the beach he was but she could run for days and it's not like she could miss him.

It didn't take that long to find him and she was running up to him. "Jon! I'm real, you're not going mad. Fuck! You forgot your barriers! Start thinking about walls, Jon! Between your brain and the voices, start thinking about walls. Strong ones."

Jack had no damned clue if that was how he pictured it but other people had done things by some sort of muscle memory so maybe just reminding him that he could would help.

Walls? Jonothon's brow furrowed and he looked up at her helplessly, hands still clutching to the sides of his head.

... Walls?

Just... barriers, between himself and the murmurs? He looked down at the sand, and then nodded quietly. What was the mind if not what you made of it, right? And in his mind, he was going to build walls. Giant constructs of brick... no... think theatrical. Decoupled drywall. Mass-loaded vinyl barrier. Anti-vibration pads.

Filters to gather up the murmurs and muffle them. And then...

He opened his eyes and glanced out at the ocean.

White noise, for whatever trickled through.

His mind was what he made of it. And now, so bloody help him, his mind had walls.

He slumped a little in relief after a few moments of sitting and just listening to the quiet.

//Oh thank god.//

Jack blew out a breath and then scowled mightily, "The little furry bastards left that out of the fucking notes and are we going to have a talk? Oh. Yes."

Then her mouth twisted into the wryest of smiles, "Hi Jon. I'm Jack, a friend of yours, and no you're not going fucking crazy. You're a telepath and now I'm real fucking glad I asked you this very fucking week about this shit."

//You... did?//

His voice still seemed distant, like it was coming from somewhere far away. Not distracted, just... not strong.

New.

//Afraid I don't... remember. Anything. Hannibal's note said that... was temporary, though.//

She nodded. "Yeah, I know you don't. If you didn't remember your own fucking husband, like balls are you gonna remember me. You teach up at the school. So does your husband, so the fuck do I. That's how we know each other. Guess the island does this weird weekend shit on the regular just this week it skipped me and a couple others but caught almost everyone else I know. It blows over by Monday. It's Sunday. One more day, buddy."

//Far as I know... that's th'first good news I've ever heard,// Jono replied. Almost joked, really. See? He had it in him! //... What a shite way t'spend a weekend.//

There was some understatement for good measure, see?

"Yeah, never found myself wanting Monday to come so fucking bad in my life and it's the day I gotta have a class ready," Jack .. didn't really joke. "This is balls. If the fucking little gossipmongers had mentioned this part instead of giggling like rude little assholes over everybody waking up in bed with a stranger, I could've told you this shit earlier."

//Gossipmongers...?//

He'd been a little too preoccupied for radio.

She gestured absently at a squirrel nearby, "The squirrels on this island are sentient and they go around collecting gossip on people and having other people read it on the radio. You've read the radio notes a few times recently yourself. It's usually mostly benign shit, you know? Just what's gone on in the island on that day. This time.."

Jack's face tightened and she shot the squirrel such a venomous look that it took off into the trees with a flick of its little fluffy tail. ".. they fucked up but good. They made it sound like you were confused about the guy you were in bed with and that you'd forgotten how to talk. They didn't say shit about 'he forgot he knows how to build barriers and is hearing every fucking thought every sentient creature on the motherfucking island is having'."

See Jono. See Jono slant a side-eye in the direction the squirrel had run off.

//... How would they have known?//

He hadn't even really been able to communicate the issue to Hannibal, after all. But he supposed Hannibal really didn't have enough context to figure out what was happening, either.

"I dunno, buddy, you think a guy they know is a goddamn telepath clutching his fucking head like it was about to blow apart might've been a clue?" Jack asked gently.

//... Ah. Point.//

Since he'd been doing a great deal of that since yesterday.

"MMhm," Jack was not real happy with the squirrels just now. "Any better now? I assume so since you're talking and not just, y'know, screaming."

Jono gave a slow nod.

//Head hurts, a bit. Nothing t'be done for that. The rest...// He waved vaguely at his chest. //Is... apparently normal.//

It didn't feel normal. But at least he wasn't actually burning to death.

Jack chewed her lower lip for a second, "I could maybe try something for the headache if you want. Don't know if it'll help. The rest of you.. yeah, the fire's normal. You been like this since I've known you. It's bright but it don't hurt people or burn things unless you really want it to."

//That's a relief,// Jono admitted, a little quietly. //I'd wondered.//

Worried. He'd worried.

//What've you got for the headache...? I can't take anything orally.//

Obviously.

"Nah," Jack said. She made sure she was as calm as she ever was and stepped right on up into the flames to look up into his face, "Just energy, see? You're probably getting a whole lot of me up in your shit but you're not hurting me any." A beat. "Kinda tickles."

She stepped back after just a small moment. "I got medigel. It's an injectable. If you wanna try it, bare a forearm for me.

Well, there went Jonothon's eyes going wide as suddenly, Jack was right up in his business. Physically and mentally, though his walls did a great deal to blunt anything ugly that was none of his business, it was hard to avoid some manner of connection that way.

He looked faintly dazed after she stepped back again. And then shook his head a little to clear it before shrugging out of his jacket to offer her his arm.

It was a bit bloody cold to be sitting out in the set without his coat on, but those leather sleeves didn't roll up too readily, either. And what, was he going to have to worry about catching a cold? Honestly.

//At this rate, I'll try anything once. What's th'worst it'll do?//

Jack shrugged, "Make you drunk and giggly if I give you more than your mass requires."

She didn't bother with a patch test. Jon had told her that he basically couldn't die. She wasn't even sure if this would help the meat parts of him.

Dialed her Omni to medigel injection and held it over his arm, letting it do its superfine hypospray thing.

//Well, this'll be interesting, then.//

Especially since his mass was a hollowed-out mess, and guessing that one accurately could very well be a swing and a miss. He watched her apply the spray with some vague curiosity.

//Get me drunk on medical gel and at least I'll end this weekend on a high note, I suppose.//

If it worked and that headache was at all physical in nature, he'd feel better. Medigel would work on anyone up to stepping straight through the doors of death and nobody really knew how. It wasn't something anyone in her galaxy wanted to look too closely at.

"I mean, I could get you drunk by getting drunk while sitting next to you," Jack offered, "Which would be more fun for me. Except it takes a lot to get me drunk so mostly you'd just get buzzed. We talked about that, too."

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