Learning to Breathe (Primer)

[Hector Vidal]

(( OOC: Picking up just a little while after the Museum/Medlab incident… call it a week. I’m assuming here that Primer has enough sources of information that he’s worked out more or less the same things the Institute knows about Hector’s mutation, such that a recruitment attempt makes sense.))

The nice thing about Central Park, Hector muses as he runs along the lesser-used jogging trails, is that it’s big. Big enough that he can sprint full-out, and nobody will be able to watch him for long enough to realize that he’s been running a hundred-meter dash for about the last hour and a half.

According to his pedometer, he’s run about 45 kilometers since breakfast. Which is, like, 30 kilometers per hour. Which, OK, is slower than a speeding bullet, but still… it’s just not natural.

That said, in the last few days he’s started coming to terms with the idea that he’s not entirely natural himself. He’s stopped pretending to sleep at night, using the time to catch up on his reading instead… he’d rather play video games or surf the ‘net, but his folks would notice he was awake, and that would lead to questions he’s not ready to answer yet.

Fortunately, they mostly bought Josh’s story about Hector’s having helped out some of the victims, which kept Mom from going into hysterics when he came home with blood on his pants. Of course, that means they’re both heaping praise on him for being some kind of hero when he’d been the one to cause the whole thing, and he’s pretty sure the guilt from that would be keeping him up at night if he were still sleeping.

Instead, it’s just making him run a lot.

Frustrated, he puts on an extra burst of speed, as though pushing himself to the finish line… and is astonished when the “wall” he expects to hit never materializes, and he just keeps going at the new speed. Which lasts for about a minute before he realizes he’s being watched by some guy in a suit. Crap.

He skids to a halt not far from his observer, belated realizing he should at least be breathing hard, or sweating, or something, and decides to take the offensive. "Whatcha lookin’ at?"

[Primer]

Recruiting is not usually Primer’s thing. He’s too well known for one thing-- if he’d anticipated becoming the leader of an elite terrorist group he’d probably have turned down some of those CNN and Crossfire appearances (though he is somewhat amusedly anticipating the day they match him up with Worthington as co-defenders of mutant rights) but what’s done is done and the fact is that he now enjoys a recognition around the city about on par with a talk show host or famous news anchor. Then there’s the fact that he’s the number one and, therefore, shouldn’t be doing the leg work, if only to keep up appearances. Sheridan’s rather good at the job as well; he’d kept the X-men off that earthquake girl long enough for her to do some pretty serious damage just wandering around free. All in all he just doesn’t get out to recruit as much as he’d thought he would in the beginning.

One of the sad disillusionments of a promotion to management, he thinks wryly, looking up as Vidal flashes past him again, still not even seeming winded. This kid is something worth venturing out for-- the way he’d set the museum into a panic without even trying makes Primer’s hands itch the way raw, undirected power always does. Better yet Vidal is young, probably still somewhat impressionable, but seemingly wise enough or wary enough not to join the Institute right off the bat like so many young mutants unfortunately seem apt to do, and-

"Whatcha lookin’ at?"

-not without some modicum of backbone it seems. Primer smiles and unfolds himself languidly from the bench where he’s been sitting starting the boy immediately on a weak dose of pheromones that mingles respect and trust, the cocktail he’s used on patients searching for some sort of paternal authority figure in the past when making a first impression.

“That’s quite a talent you have there,” he says, smiling warmly and infusing the compliment with an added boost of confidence for Hector’s benefit, trying to reproduce the glow you get when someone you want to impress acknowledges you. He’s found teenage boys are particularly susceptible to this method, make them feel impressive while simultaneously reassured and secure and they usually turn fairly docile. “My name is Doctor Sean Garrison. You may have heard of me,” he manages, through a lot of practice, to make that line sound appropriately self-depreciating while still maintaining a baseline of calm, unruffled confidence, “and if so you’ll know that I’m involved in efforts to help developing… talent… such as yourself explore their options.” None of this is exactly untrue and Central Park is hardly the place to trot out the terrorist pitch, better if he can get the boy to at least agree to talk to him, develop some sort of rapport, before he springs that. “Would you be willing to give me an hour or so of your time? I’m sure you have some questions about all this I could answer.” He shifts his weight back a bit onto his heels, a minute indication that he’s finished speaking and ups the dose of trust and respect pheromones a tiny bit.