Settling In

[Bobby Drake]

> “It's ok, there's no need to try and make me see the bright side of things.”

Bobby blushes slightly at the comment. "Was I that obvious? Sorry. It’s actually part of my job description… I just happen to suck at it."

Still, it’s obvious the kid wasn’t in the mood to be jollied, and Bobby doesn’t blame him one bit. And he really has no idea what to say in response to his comment about his family. So he decides to fall back on the time-tested strategy of changing the subject.

"So, this illusionist gift of yours," he starts out, emphasizing the word ‘gift’ only slightly, "mind showing it off? Only other illusionist I ever met was Niki, and he’s been out of town for a while... never got much chance to see him in action."

[Reinhart van Hinkel]

"I can try, but I'm still quite shakey, newly awoken and all. Right, hold on" he said, setting the book down and stepping away from the tree. He stared off into space, the midway point between Bobby and himself and started to concentrate. Something simple, something easy. He can do that, he had to in order to master this. An image flashed into his mind and he began visualising it, thinking of all the words to describe and embody this one object. Then, fading from out of no where, the image of an apple floated into existence between them. Green and shiney, it looked like the perfect apple for eating, the exact shape and everything a normal one would be. Opening his eyes to see it hovering there, he allowed his mind to adjust so he wouldn't have to focus on it entirely so that he could speak and view this for himself aswell. "Go ahead, touch it. Try and bite it. If your friends here are right, once you touch it, it should be everything exactly like you know of an apple whilst never being real at all".

[Bobby Drake]

(( OOC: Not sure how Reinhart’s power interacts with mutant enhanced senses. My inference from your profile is that, once someone touches the projection, all their senses are fooled because it’s their own mind fooling them. Until then, it’s just a holographic projection and doesn’t fool enhanced senses that a hologram wouldn’t fool. I posted under that theory, but if I got it wrong let me know and I’ll edit. ))

Bobby watches the boy concentrate and does his best to sit still, making no distracting sounds or movements. Of course, Reinhart will eventually have to learn enough control that Bobby could set off fireworks without disrupting the boy’s concentration, but that sort of thing takes years… they have to crawl before they can walk.

And he has to admit, it’s an impressive effort for a new mutant. It looks real, except for the fact that it’s floating in mid-air. Well, and the fact that it doesn’t cast a shadow and its heat-signature is all wrong… a real apple would have a different heat capacity from the air around it, would create a thermal boundary at its surface. But those are all incredibly subtle differences; if he weren’t looking for flaws he’d never have noticed them.

> “"Go ahead, touch it.”

Bobby reaches out to the floating projection tentatively. Despite Reinhart’s claim, he expects his fingers to pass right through the illusory apple; his eyes widen in surprise when he touches it instead, smooth and cool. "Wow… you’re right!"

It’s not just his fingers that are fooled… the apple feels entirely real, now. It’s no longer floating, but resting in his hand with a satisfying heft, cool to both his skin and his thermal perceptions. Even with his eyes closed he’s aware of it; when he brings it to his face and the smell of apple is subtle, but present.

Feeling slightly foolish, he attempts to take a bite out of it, and is surprised again by the crunch of it under his teeth, the juices dripping down his chin, the sweetness of it. If he’s understood Reinhart’s mutation properly, all of this is no longer the kid’s doing, but Bobby’s own mind; basically he’s being telepathically manipulated into imagining an apple, but more convincingly than he’d be able to imagine it on his own. He wonders whether the Professor’s training in mental resistance would apply here, if he could not-perceive the apple if he wanted to… or turn it into a Granny Smith or something by force of his own will… but that, also, is an exercise for another day.

"That’s pretty impressive, Reinhart." He takes another bite, then grins mischievously as another test occurs to him. "Think fast!" He throws the apple in his hand at Reinhart, wondering what that will do, if anything.

[Reinhart van Hinkel]

((You've got it in one. Like a mild for of Hypnosis, in a sense))

Pleased with himself that he had successfully made an illusion with just his pure will, he was encouraged by the look of suprise on Bobby's face, but wasn't expecting the illusion to be used against him either. This was a new experience for Reinhart as he quickly threw his hands up infront of himself to try and catch the hurtling apple - and was quite shocked that he, himself, could feel it. He caught it in his right hand, and he turned it about to look at it.
"Go figure..." he mumbled. So this was how his power felt on the recieving end... but what else could that mean? If this is how a person interperreted it once they came into physical contact, does that mean that in their mind they could use their own abilities to interact with it? Or would their abilities pass straight through the object, and carry on beyond it.

"Bobby, do me a favour. Freeze this" he asked politely, tossing the apple back at him in the air.

((Now this bit I've come up with an idea for. If the person is hypnotised into thinking it is real, then they'll see it affecting the illusion itself - however, because it's an illusion, the ability should pass straight through and strike something else. Atleast, that's what I'm coming up with in my mind!))

[Bobby Drake]

(( ooc: sounds good. Bobby’s power isn’t really a fire-and-miss thing, but I get the idea.))

Bobby laughs good-naturedly at Reinhart’s expression when he catches the apple, and wonders what any of this would look like to a third observer. "Good thing it wasn’t – " he stops in mid-sentence, having been about to say “Good thing it wasn’t a knife” before realizing just exactly how insensitive that would have been, " um, didn’t hit you in the head, huh?"

> "Bobby, do me a favour. Freeze this"

Bobby’s a little surprised by the request, then catches on to what Reinhart has in mind and grins. "Heh. Yeah, that’s an interesting idea. Hm…" Using his power to freeze an object has become practically reflex for him thanks to years of practice, but this time he decides to go at it carefully, the way he did back when he was first getting control of it.

First he examines the “apple” carefully, feeling out its heat content with his mind (he remembers, back when he was Reinhart’s age, imagining his cryogenic fields as invisible fingers) before consuming that heat, leaving a frozen apple in Reinhart’s hand… at least in theory.

In reality, of course, there is no apple, nor is there a spoon, and all there is in Reinhart’s hand is a ball of ice. Whether anybody is aware of that reality is another question altogether.

[Reinhart van Hinkel]

To Reinhart, the apple - bite marks and all - was still in his hand, only now it was incredibally colder and frozen. Now the next test he wanted to try. If he was under the effect of his own ability, could he then also banish his own ability? Could he turn this on and off, or would it happen every time a random incident occured where he thought about something strongly? (It was at this juncture, however, when he realised he was incredibally lucky to have gone through puberty at an early age. A pair of floating breasts every so often may have been slightly troublesome in company).
Focusing inside his own mind again, he thought of the Apple and what it was now, almost like he could feel it still. Then, concentrating his will and effort, he started to imagine it returning into nothingness, and very slowly that's exactly what it did. All what was left in Reinhart's hand was a small ball of ice.

[Bobby Drake]

Bobby stares incredulously as the frozen apple in Reinhart’s hand turns into a ball of ice. Not that it should surprise him, exactly; he’d known the apple was an illusion to begin with; it’s just difficult reconciling that with the reports of his own senses. It had been as real as, well, anything.

"Dude… that is one awesome talent. Given any thought to what you want to do with it, once you get it under control?"

[Reinhart van Hinkel]

"What I want to... do with it?" he said confusedly, but then realised how stupid he must sound. Of course, these people probably all have a long term goal with their abilities. Something they can go on and do with it, to help or hinder others, or just ues it for their own personal gain. In the flurry of change, Reinhart hadn't even given that area a thought before - but now his mind was swimming with oppertunities.
"I... don't know in truth. I don't know what I can possibly do with this, other than trick people and cause them grief".

[Bobby Drake]

> "What I want to... do with it?"

The question seems to confuse Reinhart, and once again Bobby is reminded of his own first few months at the Institute, when all he really wanted was for this freaky ice thing to just go away and let him go back to studying to be an accountant. Reinhart doesn’t exactly seem like the accountant type, but the basic reaction seems similar.

> "I... don't know in truth. I don't know what I can possibly do with this, other than trick people and cause them grief".

Bobby gives what he hopes is a reassuring smile. "Oh, you’d be surprised. Once you get this thing under control I bet there’s all kinds of therapies your talent would be useful for, and any stadium or performance center or band would kill to have you on their special-effects team. Not to mention it’ll probably make you instantly popular with the ladies.

And, for that matter, don’t underestimate the usefulness of causing the right people grief at the right time. We do get into fights from time to time around here, much as we try not to. "

[Reinhart van Hinkel]

((>_> -Steals your typestyle- It looks pretty!))

> "We do get into fights from time to time around here, much as we try not to. "

"Fights?" he replied, chuckling lightly. "I bet that's quite a spectacle to see in this school". His mind was full of weird and wonderful confrontations about what could possibly happen, when he remembered something he should of asked vital to any school.

"So, any bad apples or groups I should know to stay away from?".

[Bobby Drake]

> "Fights? I bet that's quite a spectacle to see in this school".

Bobby laughs. "Yeah, it’s something all right. Last time, it was a rogue government task force invading… razed the place half to the ground. It’s a miracle nobody was killed." He thinks about it a second and adds "Actually, that was the second time we were invaded by a rogue government task force. We’re hoping to break the tradition; it gets old. "

It occurs to Bobby that he’s leaving out the Brotherhood’s attempt to kidnap Gail, but talking about that will lead to talking about their visit to the future, and Bobby’s not ready to discuss that with anybody yet. Sure, he’d filled out a situation report like a good little soldier, but that’s different: a sit-rep doesn’t include his own feelings, or his growing discomfort with the direction the X-Men are going.

> "So, any bad apples or groups I should know to stay away from?".

"Mm. That’s… well, that’s not a simple question. And I may not be the best guy to ask, either… I mean, there are reasons I’m in my fifth year of high school, y’know? But yeah, there’s some history it’ll probably help to know."

Geez, he thinks, where do I even start? "So, OK… you probably know about Magneto and his mutant Brotherhood; they were all over the news a few years ago when they attacked Worthington Industries. For a while we were fighting the Brotherhood all the time. It’s gotten more complicated now. I don’t want to get into the details, but we seem to have a temporary truce going while we, um, pursue a common project. So there might be some Brotherhood folks around the Institute from time to time.

Also, a couple of students here were, um, recruited from the Brotherhood, you could say: Nikki Blagetovich and John Allerdyce." He stops for a second to think about what he was about to say, and shrugs. "None of which really answers your question, I guess. I dunno… I guess I wouldn’t say you should stay away from anyone, but you should know things will probably get kinda awkward. "

[Reinhart van Hinkel]

> "I guess I wouldn’t say you should stay away from anyone, but you should know things will probably get kinda awkward. "

"So... just a case of using my head and judging people for myself, right?" he said almost disappointedly. That was a pain. Not so much the judging part, he was referring to having to go around to each person at some point and getting his bearings. Would have been much easier with a 'Stay away from Jimmy, he's a wildcracker'. Still, couldn't be helped.

There was one more subject Reinhart wanted to discuss. "Since I've come to this place, all they've done is make me feel welcome and show me to my dorm room and everything but... I've not actually taken part in a single lesson yet - and as such, I don't know what kind of lessons there are to be taught. I'm guessing, seeing as though this is a school for", he paused trying to think of the right word. "Mutants". It was still strange to say that word, he thought, and even stranger seeing as though he was one now. "There would be special classes to develop abilities, right?".

[Bobby Drake]

> "So... just a case of using my head and judging people for myself, right?"

"Yeah, pretty much. I mean, the whole mutant angle definitely makes it more entertaining than at your typical high-school, but really they’re all just people. Usual complicated mess, plus mutations." He shrugs. "I’ll suggest you not hit on Laurie unless you’re serious about it, though… her boyfriend doesn’t seem like the jealous type but I hear you don’t want to get on his bad side. Plus, his sister is probably teaching some of your classes, so, you know, you can dig yourself a pretty deep hole that way."

> " I've not actually taken part in a single lesson yet - and as such, I don't know what kind of lessons there are to be taught."

Bobby blinks in surprise at that. Geez… that’s weird. I mean, sure, he transferred in mid-semester and everything, but I’d have expected the faculty to put him in some classes. Then again, maybe they’d been too distracted by all the disappearances.

> "There would be special classes to develop abilities, right?".

Oh! That makes more sense, then… he doesn’t mean regular classes. "Yes, of course. Not to develop them, exactly, so much as to develop control over them… though often the abilities themselves do get stronger with use. I think Josh is still teaching the basic power-use classes for mentalists; I’m guessing you just fell through the administrative cracks. We just got through a bit of a chaotic time… still some catching up to do."

(( OOC: Feel free to just decide what classes Reinhart is taking… see this thread for more details. It doesn’t really matter, it’s there only as an opportunity for RP in different settings. ))