(no subject)

[nofortunateson]

Who| The Boy Who Would Be Agent North Dakota (and the man himself, occasionally)
What| mostly, a young man being either very responsible or very irresponsible, depending on the precise moment
Where| all over Legion World, see starters for details
When| for the duration of Time Ripples


we are young we run free
Within a handful of hours of waking up in an unfamiliar bed, in an unfamiliar house full of unfamiliar military-looking supplies, Gabriel's figured out more or less what the situation is. Sure, he spends a few hours at the beginning there creeping though the habitats with a paranoia-backpack full of weaponry and food, but hey. No one has to know about that. Once he's figured out that this superhero thing is actually apparently real, he can be found for several hours zipping around the habitat deck performing a series of increasingly hair-raising manuvers, really getting his flying skills down and testing the essentials, like how much speed assist you really can get from a freefall. Trying out the shield-bubbles is reserved for periods when he's catching his breath, and he spends awhile figuring out how big he can make them (surprisingly big), if they can move or not (they can, apparently, under certain circumstances), and at one point if he can use them to float on a body of water (he can, but trial-and-error shows the bubble definitely has to be big enough to be buoyant). It's not a stretch to see North's features in the lanky seventeen year old, though both his unruly fluff of white-blond hair and the silver ring curled around his bottom lip are outside his usual regulation standards.


you won't wanna be nowhere else
Once he's figured out his powers well enough - and once he starts grasping the actual scope of the situation - he takes to the full breadth of Legion World itself, a sort of patrol by way of fascinated sightseeing. He's back to the backpack, though with all the reports of actual kids running around, there's less in the way of weapons and more in the way of snacks and amusements. He doesn't know what he's going to do with anyone who de-aged to three but still has laser vision, but he guesses that with the bubbles and all, he's probably one of the best people to handle it. When he feels like taking a breather from all the novelty he ends up crashing at Taylor's place, which is both comfier and far less quiet than what's apparently his own house. Without his sister around, it's nice to have someone, and Taylor has a habit of bringing people back on a regular basis. It means he's making things to munch on pretty regularly, but all things considered, playing co-host to a bunch of his (apparently) similarly-afflicted teammates at least lets him pretend that this is kind of normal.


just leave your problems on the shelf
It's that same hunger for normalcy that leads him to post a quick sign-up for pick-up basketball outside of one of the sim rooms. And, in a few cases, offer unsolicited advice to likely-looking teammates that they should really consider signing up for a game.

Hey, it's a base full of super heroes. Who doesn't want to see that match?


(stay up late, we don't sleep)
It all makes a lot more sense when he's older - the hours when the ripples trough enough that he's suddenly North again, with years and years of memories behind him and all the old calluses and scars back where they should be, along with the jarring clarity of who he was beside who he is without those gradual intervening decades to soften the comparison. The first time he comes back Theta's all over him, and he spends a lot of his time when he's not a teenager doing what he did on the Mother of Invention, walking wherever his feet take him, reassuring the little nightlight flicker in the back of his mind that it's all right, that he's doing great, that it won't last forever. Sometimes he's talking apparently to himself, a low constant murmur, sometimes he's just humming a vague semblance of a tune. Sometimes he's quiet, metronome of his footsteps broken only by the occasional chuckle or hum. Rarely, there's a little flicker of purple and blue over his shoulder, though that blinks out the moment anyone else draws too close.

Comments

Stay up Late, We don't Sleep

[goddamngrenades]

After a few days of having little North hang around and help out at his place while they compile information and become ye olde hub for recovering time displacees- it's good to see his friend again. Full grown and talking to Theta and himself. Not fair, probably, to immediately take that time to wander close and headbutt his shoulder but-

He's been the responsible one for a few days. It's fucking exhausting. A break to whine feels overfuckingdue. "Goddamn I missed you."

Just. The solid, calm certainty that is North Dakota.

[nofortunateson]

North tries not to be too much of a nuisance when he's doing this, and he's surprised when York tracks him down. Even if it's just rambling along the path between the house and the bar. He blinks at the insistent thump into his shoulder, then snorts a laugh, spurred on by the little flicker of empathy that sparks off of Theta.

"I'm gonna take that as a compliment, and not that teenage me was driving you insane," he murmurs wryly, obligingly remaining still and hooking an arm around York to ruffle his hair.

[goddamngrenades]

"Nah, he's great. But I'm the only sane man right now and I'm not used to that." So, so not used to it. He is not meant to be the only responsible adult type person keeping track of many damaged people, some of which threaten him with violence out of well earned paranoia. It's. Jarring. And draining. And exhausting. At least it's not all bad- keeping an eye on little Gabe is stressful but not in a way that'll kill him.

Mostly.

"Also you were such a little shit. Jesus. No wonder we get along so well."

[nofortunateson]

"You think I was bad, you should've seen South at that age," he drawls, relaxing himself with the familiar weight of York against him, like his troubles are a weight he can let slip and tumble to the ground if he leans just a little more.

[goddamngrenades]

"What made you mellow out? Also: Rude, not telling me about being loaded or living in Germany." So rude. The most rude. IF he looked up Gabe could see he was deeply wounded by this.

[nofortunateson]

"If I had to guess? It was probably the two decades of shooting and getting shot at." He chuckles at the gripe, giving York's shoulder a friendly pat. "Our family moved around a bit. We sort of split time between America and Germany. It didn't seem all that relevant to Freelancer business."

[goddamngrenades]

"Yeah, I guess. Still feel kinda weird finding out like this, though." Like there's any other way to find this shit out. He continues the lean, hands slipping up to loop a careless arm around North's waist. Just for a little while longer he can let North be the adult.

Then it's saddling back up and getting on with keeping everyone else settled and informed. Ish.

we are young we run free

[hallaifyouherd]

The woods that make up her biome are relatively peaceful. So the panicked chatter of birds and startled snuffling of nugs going for cover gets her attention first and foremost. Sliding out from under the cover of her tent, Marjara slinks into the brush and waits, staring outward for signs of whatever ruckus has come to 'her' corner of the station.

This place is supposed to be free of enemies, but old habits die hard. There's a spark of magic around her fingers waiting to be released, and depending on how quickly North goes zooming past?

He might see a pair of eyes staring from the shadows of the nearby foliage, gleaming unnaturally like a cat's.

[nofortunateson]

The transition from open-air speed runs to slaloming through dense forest is enough to put the brakes on the more aggressive accelerations, and the first time Gabriel sends a cluster of birds winging is when he zigs instead of zags and goes crashing into the undergrowth.

Okay then. Check 'superhuman reflexes' off the potential superpowers list.

The next run goes slower, though he's still darting and weaving through the trees with a coltish newness to his flying, and he pulls up short at the remains of a crumbling arch with a huff of a laugh and turns to look back the way he'd gone. Then back at where he is. Which is when he finally sees a pair of luminous eyes fixed on him, too high up to be a cat or a dog, too close together to be a deer.

He yelps and wheels back on instinct, thudding to the forest floor as he loses his focus on levitating. In a same instant a dome-shield snaps up around him, summoned out of panic rather than intention, solid and a luminous pale blue.

[hallaifyouherd]

Well that's an interesting sort of barrier. But she recognizes it as what it is, or what it appears to be. More than that, she recognizes the panic in his eyes.

So she steps free of the brush, her hand lifted in placation. "Easy there. I think we've both startled each other enough for today."

What was too high to be a cat or dog is still rather small in stature: a short, slender tattooed elf in what appears to be a mix of modern and ancient clothing, peering at him through the light of the shield. In the daylight? Her eyes no longer hold that eerie sheen.

[nofortunateson]

It all happens so quickly that awareness of the dome around him has barely set in before Gabriel sees the leaves rustle and reveal that those eyes belong to . . . a woman. He swallows drily, eyes flicking up and down, taking in superficial details that mark her as unfamiliar but still not as alien to his life-as-he-understood-it as things like flight and superpowers. It takes a moment's effort, but he dispels the shield, picking himself up and dusting off the seat of his pants.

"Ah- sorry," he manages, salvaging the one scrap of graciousness he can manage after the knockout combo of crashing through the woods, screaming, and finally falling on his ass, all in front of an awfully attractive person. "I didn't know anyone else was out here."

[hallaifyouherd]

At that, she glances once at her campsite, then back to the young man now pulling himself to his feet, and she cocks an eyebrow higher. Alright. Probably hard to see going at the speed he was, but still.

"Luckily, no one else is. Not that I've seen. People don't pass through here a great deal," she remarks, lowering her hand. It might become obvious now that he's taking her in that she's only got the one. The other sleeve hangs knotted and empty at her left side.

[nofortunateson]

"Oh. Is this all your- you know, your space?" he asks, gesturing vaguely to the ruin-dotted woods (and campsite, now that he's actually looking). He thinks maybe the term is 'habitat,' but that sounds so much like a zoo enclosure that he fishes for any other term that even halfway passes muster.

Stay up late, we don't sleep

[short_changed]

The ripples are disorienting, no doubt about that. Connie has fluctuated between a more...hopeful Freelancer and her current self over the past little while, and though her she doesn't appear to remember what she knows now when she shifts, she remembers everything that's happened when she's back to normal. It's unsettling enough that she's retreating to her safe house in her hab more often than not, building up a small campfire in outside of her cabin to sit and watch the flames.

If she didn't know just how much the Project had been risking them all and how broken it really was, she'd be envious of the apparent happiness of her younger self. Tugging the thick blanket Wash had given her tighter around her against the evening chill she leans back in her seat when the sound of someone approaching catches her ear.

Turning to the sound the faint glow of purple catches her eye, the shape and size similar to Delta's hologram. It's gone a moment later, but in its absence the firelight silhouettes a familiar figure walking through the trees.

"...North?"

[nofortunateson]

At first, North hadn't realized that he'd wandered past the border of his own habitat. He'd just been following the stream away from his house, picking through the woods guided by the sound of running water and murmuring with Theta in the quiet. The smell of smoke had caught his attention first, confirmed moments later by the faintest glimmer when he'd scanned the distance with his heat vision.

After that? It was just curiosity who lived downstream of him and was out tonight with no apparent company apart from a little fire. He sees her outline first, warm umber tinged lighter where it faces the yellow-white of the blaze, and when she turns to him he blinks back into ordinary eyesight and stops cold.

It feels like a long time since he's seen her. Longer still since he'd seen her out of armor, a teammate rather than an ill-defined threat and target.

"CT." He draws up close enough for the light to show him, steps careful, ready for a response. He's been cagey enough with Wash, and he just left him behind. CT he hunted, him and the rest of them, and if she remembers - fuck, if she remembers-

He tucks his hands deeper into his pockets, taking a measured breath. "Been awhile."

[short_changed]

It's been a cold comfort that out of all the Freelancers here, or the ones who had been here for any amount of time, Texas was the only one she hadn't been able to keep a step ahead of before the end. She had watched on the screens as her former teammates had systematically isolated and terminated the group she had defected to, but all she had to do was keep running at that point. 'Course, that didn't work out too well for her in the end.

"It has."

Connie eyes track the change in his posture, unconsciously feeling the tension in the pit of her stomach wind tighter as he stands there. She doesn't know what sort of new tricks he might have in this world, but this is her turf, and she's got plenty of ways to get out of a sticky situation if she needs to.

Letting out a soft sigh, she leans forward to reach for another log to throw on the fire as she gives the empty seat not too far from hers a tip of her head.

"Seat's free if you want to join me...clear the air a little."

[nofortunateson]

It's better than he expects - though that seems like that's always been his job too. Be ready for the worst, and he'd hope for the best here except that he's not sure there is a best in this situation. Even taking the offered seat - slowly, not necessarily tense but always ready - is its own kind of worst-case.

"Thanks." He leans his elbows onto his knees, an awful position to draw from, if that's any comfort. The smile he gives is a lot of things - rueful, automatic, subdued - but happiness doesn't figure much into it. "That's probably overdue."

[short_changed]

"It's good to see you."

Connie matches North's posture a little, keeping her hands out from her blanket and in plain sight. There's a faint curve to her lips as she watches him, comparing his appearance to when she first met up with South again. She almost misses how straightforward and cathartic it can be just brawling it out. But North is harder to read.

"York...Taylor caught me up with some things when I got here. What's the last thing you remember?"

[nofortunateson]

"Before showing up here? Defecting. The Mother of Invention crash-landing." He gives a huff of an almost-laugh, shaking his head. "I went to step out planetside with South and instead I showed up here. You?"

just leave your problems on the shelf

[the_civilian]

Tadashi's used to the organized chaos of a lab full of nerds and the organized chaos of a floating space station full of super heroes, but the weird 'time ripples' have tipped the meter into the 'utter chaos' zone. Someone's got to help, but those someones also have to take breaks sometimes. While basketball isn't really his sport, it's not exactly a terrible idea either.

Which is why he's poking his head into the indicated sim room.

"Is this where the pick-up game is?"

[nofortunateson]

"Hey, yeah!"

Gabriel looks back from where he's been shooting free-throws, face immediately lit up in a smile. He'd started to think no one was coming - which was fine, he guessed, he couldn't exactly demand a bunch of superheroes stop everything they were doing to get in some two-on-two with a seventeen-year-old version of their teammate.

"C'mon in. You're the first one so far."

[the_civilian]

Yep, that's definitely a teenager he doesn't recognize. Tadashi grins back anyway, because finding yourself in an alternate reality where your future self is a super hero has to be even weirder than just finding yourself in an alternate reality with super powers.

"Thanks. I'm Tadashi, by the way." He points at the power dampener on his forearm. "You mind if I keep this on? I've never actually tried lighting a basketball on fire, but I bet it doesn't smell very good."

[nofortunateson]

"Ooh, yeah. Good idea." He gives an exaggerated wince at the thought of trying to hold a game with fire gouting everywhere, which was definitely not the kind of superpowered face-off he'd been anticipating when he put up sign-ups.

"Nice to meet you." He offers his hand, laughing a little uncertainly to himself. "I guess I go by 'North' around here? But Gabe's fine too."

He's pretty sure, anyway. Taylor's been calling him Gabe, and in a pretty natural way.

[the_civilian]

Tadashi takes the offered hand and gives it a firm, professional sort of shake.

"I think I've seen you -- well, your future self -- around, but we haven't really talked much. I did have a run-in with South, and I'm pretty sure I can see some family resemblance between you two."

South was...memorable, to say the least.

[nofortunateson]

"Yep, that would be the twin thing." Introductions made, he rambles to the rack of balls, flipping one into his hands and tossing it over. "Hope she wasn't too hard on you."

It's the polite sentiment to express. Even if half the time South's rough edges are fantastic to watch in action.