Participants:
| Scene Title | Run, Hide or Die |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Melissa outlines Kendall's options for staying alive in a dangerous world. |
| Date | June 21, 2010 |
The night before Kendall probably got home before Melissa. After Kendall took off, she made some phone calls and got picked up, only to be returned home about an hour later, cleaned up, bandaged, and wearing a blue sling. And not looking at all happy. Stupid bullets. She wasn't very chatty at all, and went to be early, drugged up on pain meds.
Now, however, she's downstairs, sitting at the table, wearing a black sling with pink skulls, and looking quite aggravated at having to eat her TV dinner one handed.
Kendall had an… interesting evening the night before. There were guns present, and so he ran away. There were also penguins, but who cares about that when compared to people shooting guns and stuff. He actually woke up an hour or so ago, but he's been reading comic books since then, so he's been in his room. Now, however, he's starving, so down he goes. Pausing when he catches sight of Melissa, he shakes his head. "That's why I ran…" he starts off defensively. Yeah, he ran like a scaredy cat.
Melissa glances over, her head tilting at the defensive tone in his voice. "You expecting me to be mad at you, Kendall?" She shakes her head, reaching for her Coke and sipping at it. "I'm not mad. I wanted you away from there. I didn't want you to get hurt. That's why I got my gun out at all. If he'd just started firing into penguins, someone was gonna get hurt. And probably someone more innocent than me."
"Like me." Kendall points out. "Who was that maniac, anyway? Did you know?" seems like guys who drive around with hunting rifles in their car should by all rights be somewhat notorious.
Melissa shakes her head. "Nope, but Magnes seems to. Called him Adam. Whoever he is, he's dangerous though. You see him, you go the other way and call me. I'll be pissed if something happens to you."
"I think I'd be pissed if something happened to me too. Either pissed, or, uh… dead." well there's a happy thought. Kendall scratches the side of his face, eying Melissa's arm. "Is that normal? I mean, people randomly pulling out guns like that. I don't get out much."
Melissa's lips curve in a wry smile, but she shakes her head. "No, it's not normal. If it was, I'd have more than two bullet scars. Or, well, one scar, one fresh wound. See though why I want you to know how to protect yourself?" She looks at his hands. "Found a ring yet? So you can go invisible?"
Kendall blinks at Melissa at the question, distracted from eying her bullet wounds that are hidden behind bandages. "What? Oh, uh…. not yet." a ring of invisibility, huh. "Y'know, I think it's a good thing in that vision or whatever that I didn't get the One Ring. I don't want to be babbling about Precious or something in the future."
Now, Melissa may not be a geek like Kendall, but she does like her movies, so she laughs. "Yeeeeeah…You did that, I'd totally have you committed. White padded room for you, hon. Still, get a ring. You need cash?"
"I… well I dunno, I grabbed it out of a store, it wasn't my ring or anything. But why do you want me to be able to turn invisible?" Kendall asks, tilting his head. "Am I just supposed to run away from everything?" well, it's either that or have his ass handed to me at every opportunity.
"Run or hide. Unless you want to learn how to defend yourself," Melissa says with an apologetic look and tone. "Look…I'm supposed to keep you safe, but I don't want to lock you away. You need to have a life. I want you to have a life, to be happy. But it's a dangerous world we live in. More dangerous for our kind, even. Which means all of us have four options for how to handle things."
She gets up, dumping the dinner tray in the trash, putting the fork in the dishwasher, and another soda is grabbed from the fridge, set in front of Kendall. "You can run, you can hide, you can fight, or you can die." Beat. "The fourth choice is not an option for you, by the way. I'd find someone to bring you back and kick your ass. And I know someone who can do that, by the way." So she doesn't know where he is right now, but she knows him.
"I won't make the choice for you, Kendall. Whichever one you pick, I'll help you." Mel draws in a deep sigh and sits down heavily in her chair. "You should know, the Ferry is shipping some people up to Canada, where it's safer. They've offered to help you, if you want it. You certainly don't have to, and you're always welcome here, regardless. I just want you to know all the facts. All the choices you have available."
"Canada? Who the hell would want to go there?" Canada's nothing but moose and hockey and snow! "I think I'll stay here, thanks." pause. "Wait, what? Bring people back to life? I don't want to be a zombie, brains sound like they'd be disgusting to eat." Kendall frowns.
Melissa smiles, and looks a little relieved. She didn't want him to go. "Good. And people don't come back as zombies. They're real people. I've seen the results. It's pretty amazing. Scary, but amazing. Though I guess if you're already dead you don't really have anything to lose."
"Except for peace and quiet, I bet." Kendall sighs. "Being dead sounds pretty peaceful to me, doesn't it? Not, uh, that I want to be dead or anything." of course not!
His first words earn him a light smack to the back of the head. "You better not wanna be dead. I may have an arm in a sling, but I can still kick your ass," Melissa says, though she smiles. "But think about it. Whatever your choice, I'll help you figure the best way of doing it."
Kendall doesn't seem phased by Melissa's threats anymore, and looks thoughtful. "Well I think running away might be best for me, although… well, if you know anyone who teaches martial arts…" seems like someone saw Karate Kid recently. "Hiding sounds good too, come to think of it."
"The running is easy. Just keep in shape and know the city," Melissa says, nodding. "The hiding can help there too. If you can go invisible then run, you have a better chance of escape." She smiles. "Talk to Magnes about fighting though. He's teaching me. Sorta."
"Magnes?" Kendall looks dubious at that particular gem of information. "Magnes doesn't look like he can fight his way out of a wet paper bag." well that's still more than Kendall could do, he'd have difficulties with a wet paper bag made out of toilet paper.
Melissa shrugs. "It's a good place to start. If nothing else, he can keep you from getting too hurt if you fall with his gravity bit."
"I wish I could fly too. I can't do that at all, even with a Green Lantern ring." Kendall tried, but his powers are illusions, not actually manipulating reality.
"Eh, flying isn't that cool. Your hair gets all messed up, and it gets cold up there," Melissa says with a shrug. "You can do plenty with your ability though, Kendall. I bet you could immitate my power with yours, actually. I mean, you zapped me the other day with your little monster thingy, after all."
"Well yeah, I suppose. That's because you think it's going to hurt, and it does." Kendall shrugs. "It's all in your head, literally." pause. "Hey, do you know where I could get a… fake gun?" he asks her suddenly.
Melissa arches a brow. "A fake gun? Why you want a fake gun?"
"Well, there's this video game where the characters shoot themselves in the head with a gun that fires something that isn't bullets, and it lets them summon these beings and stuff like that." Persona 3 FTW! "It fires spirit energy or something."
Melissa shrugs. "Try a toy store. Sure they've got some kind of fake guns. I'm guessin' Nerf guns won't work? What about like, paintball or something?"
"No, not like that. Hmm…" Kendall goes back upstairs, and comes back down about five minutes later with a piece of paper. On it is drawn a gun, and he adds one more line and then it appears in his hand. He shows it to her. "It's gotta look like this, and actually fire." he tells her. "And I can't keep drawing it all the time, either."
"So it looks like a real gun, just isn't?" Melissa thinks for a moment then shakes her head slowly. "Maybe a real gun with blanks for bullets? I don't know."
"Well something that I can shoot myself in the head with and not get, y'know, dead." Kendall tells her. "That's what they do in the game, after all."
"Well blanks don't kill," Melissa says with a smile. "Something to think about anyway. Beyond that, I don't know. You can still try the toy stores, though."
"What are blanks, anyway?" Kendall asks, tilting his head at Melissa. "And these sort of things won't be found in toy stores, it's a gun from a video game that's rated M for mature." because it has, y'know, people shooting themselves in the head.
"Can't really say I know. I don't use blanks," Melissa says, shrugging and looking apologetic. "Check ebay?"
"I've never bought anything on Ebay, have you?" nah, Kendall just browses Ebay to see what prices his YuGiOh cards are worth. And to see all the silly stuff people sell, like the pair of haunted underwear he saw the other day.
"Nope," Melissa says cheerfully. "But it can't hurt to check, now can it?"
Kendall snorts at her cheerful response, rolling his eyes. "I wouldn't know how to buy something on Ebay. How do you pay for stuff you buy? And besides… how are you supposed to check if it actually shoots or not?"
Melissa shrugs. "No idea. But that's all the ideas I've got there. Seriously. Check. You find something, lemme know. In the mean time…I've gotta take Jerry for a walk." A grimace. "And that fluffball too."
"You still haven't found the fluffball's owner yet?" Kendall sighs. "I've seen her walking it once, but I didn't ask her name. And… I'm not in the habit of asking random people for their phone numbers." not even the hot girls, because Kendall chickens out too much.
"Found her daughter, just had a hard time hooking up with her," Melissa says, shrugging and rising to her feet to grab leashes. "And you should think about asking for phone numbers. You're seventeen. You should be out trying to snag some hot chick."
Kendall's stomach rumbles, and he looks towards the kitchen longingly. He still hasn't eaten today. "What hot girl in her right mind would want to go out with me? Sure, I could make myself look like Ashton Kutcher, or Christian Bale, but eventually the illusion would go away."
That deserves another smack to the back of the head, and so Melissa delivers it. "You're cute, hon. Now get something to eat or whatever while I take care of the dogs," she says, ruffling his hair then heading off for dog duty.
Kendall grumbles when he's smacked again, and he goes off to grab whatever looks good.