Gar and Shen - Backdated

[ax_swift]

Shen comes back to school the day after the rally, and she and Gar catch up.


Shen still wasn't sure how she felt, now that the rally had come and gone. It was all over, and it had gone as well as it might have. There had been no violence. That was the most important thing to remember. That was a small miracle in and of itself. Hopefully it would have helped mutants, and helped make up the mind of baseline humans that mutants were as human as anyone.

Still, she felt vaguely anxious, like a cage around her lungs that wouldn't quite leave her alone. That cage was still there as she walked into school, late on the Sunday afternoon, wings out, feet bare, a backpack slung over one shoulder and shifted forward so it wouldn't bump into her wing.

Gar was pacing. Was he pacing? It was probably pacing. Even if it wasn't pacing as a human, but instead deciding to take up much less space in the form of a house cat, pacing back and forth in front of one of the windows. He saw Shen's arrival and perked up, dashing to intercept her. He'd been so worried about her, what with her being pretty much at the forefront of this whole protest rally thing. Gar was supportive, that much was for sure, but he wasn't exactly sure where he stood on all of it. He was all for 'loud and proud' if people wanted to be, but with him? He had no family, no ... hope for a facade to be put up for the security of the school.

When he intercepted Shen in the hall, he let out a plaintive meow before he remembered he should shift back in order to, well, talk to her, and so he did, standing in front of her. "Hey, you're okay," he said, obviously a bit relieved. "How'd it go?"

Shen had started smiling at the sight of the green cat, and headed his way. "Hey!" She smiled at him. "It went great, really. I mean, there were the haters, but no violence. Total win. Did you watch any footage?"

"Yeah. I mean, a bit," Gar said, though he'd turned it off when things looked like they'd been about to turn violent, maybe. Or maybe he'd just chickened out. "I'll... be honest, I was kinda too nervous to watch a lot," he admitted.

"That's okay," she told him, heart clenching for him. She put her bag down and opened her arms to him for a hug. "I'm okay," she added, wrapping her arms around him. "We're all okay."

"I'm really glad," Gar replied, giving her a little squeeze in the hug. "But it went well? I mean, obviously there was media coverage, which is great," he said.

Shen's wings came around them a little, and she squeezed him back. Not too tight (superstrength kept in check), but he was definitely not the only one getting something from the hug. "Yeah," she confirmed, then pulled back, wings settling behind her again. "Yeah, we did some interviews. I didn't even tell Trish Trilby to go and eat her mike, so I'm pretty proud of my self-restraint."

He chuckled, grinning at her. "Well, I'm proud," Gar said, happily and seriously. "I mean, really, I would've loved to have come, but... without any family on the outside, it just feels like a bad idea," Gar explained.

"Some would tell you it's a bad idea when you do have family on the outside," Shen pointed out, then gave him a small smile, trying to soften the darkness of her words. "Sorry. D'you wanna come and fly for a bit? I just need to drop this off in my room," she added, picking up her bag.

"Right," Gar said, scratching the back of his head. "And yeah, flying sounds good," he said, happily. "Been awhile since I flew. Did get to try some ocean forms out, which was nice."

"Ocean?" Shen echoed, eyebrows raised curiously.

"Yeah," Gar confirmed, nodding. "Clarice and I went down to the Bahamas. Area. I don't ... know exactly where," he admitted, grinning just a little. "It was fun. I was a manta, and an octopus, and a cuttlefish, and a lemon shark, and a dolphin..." He was forgetting one, at least. "Oh, and a sea turtle," he said. "And I think a sea lion, also. I tried a lot of things out."

"No whale?" Shen asked, grinning at his list of animals. What even was a lemon shark?

"I thought about going for an orca," Gar confessed. "But I didn't go anywhere deep enough to really consider it."

"There's always something for next time," Shen stated with a smile. "Anyway, I should go drop this off. Meet you up there in five?"

"Yeah, sounds good to me," Gar replied. "Any requests?" he asked, curiously. By now, it felt like she'd flown with anything that he could think of that could fly.

"Whatever you feel like!" Shen told him as she turned to go. "See you out there!"

"Sounds good!" Man, now he had to pick? That was asking him to pick between three different ways to cook tofu; he'd probably just do all three! Yeah, okay, pteranodon was definitely on the top of the list, again...

Shen had said five minutes in case Jeanne-Marie was in (she couldn't just say hi and launch out the window, for all that they'd seen each other at the protest anyway), but her roommate wasn't, so she only dropped her bag on her bed, opened her window and jumped, spreading her wings as her hands and feet shifted to talons. This was just what she needed.

Gar had turned into a pteranodon once he'd climbed onto the roof of the school, which he'd done as a different animal, of course (he'd chosen a lemur to climb one of the drainpipes). Once he saw Shen take off out of her window, Gar followed suit, needing the altitude to take off in this form. He was just glad to see Shen looking relieved and, well, unharmed.

Shen felt the shift in the currents more than she heard or saw the pteranodon join her - huh, weird - but she filed that away as some weird instinct and just grinned at Gar when she turned around to face him, not interrupting her flight. She was still going slowly enough that he could catch up, and when he did, she just touched his wing and told him, "Tag. You're it," then closed her wings to plummet out of reach, spreading them again to make her getaway.

* * *

Back on the ground, Shen sat on the grass, then turned to lie on her belly, a way easier position on her wings. She pillowed her chin on her hands and grinned a breathless grin over at Gar, her cheeks a little pink from the exertion. "That was exactly what I needed."

Gar had flopped onto the grass on his back, his head near where Shen put hers. "Good! It was fun," he said, happily.

"It was," she agreed, and just took a few seconds to enjoy the last of that thrill, leftover from the flight. Eventually, though, she looked at Gar with a smile. "So! You went to the Bahamas with Clarice."

"Yeah," Gar said, happily. "I mean, it was kind of a date. But..." He looked up at the sky. "She wasn't really interested in that kinda thing. And, I mean, y'know. The powers training and the swimming and stuff was fun enough, date or not. I'm like, slightly darker green from it," he said, though that had mostly faded. Never stayed that way for long. "We had a little picnic on the beach. I scared away a barracuda by turning into a lemon shark," he said, grinning.

Shen laughed at that last bit. "You must've given it the fright of its life." She sobered up, and added, sympathetically, "Sorry it didn't work out."

"What didn't work out?" Gar asked, curious. "She and I are friends. We had a good time together. That's not... not working out. It's just we didn't want the same thing." He shrugged. "I should probably ease off trying to date anyway," he said. "Friends are more worthwhile to make. I'll have time for romance when I'm older."

"If that's what you want," Shen said hesitantly. "There's nothing wrong with wanting romance." Just like there was nothing wrong with not wanting it, she reminded herself, and did not think of Tommy. Nope, not even a little.

"Eh," Gar said, shrugging. "I can't figure out if I actually wanted to date or just felt like I should. So I figure I should sort that out, before, y'know, any more of that."

"Probably, yeah," Shen agreed. "You'll probably know you really want to date when you find the right person for it, anyway?"

"Probably," he said, looking up at the sky. He'd known, once, because he'd wanted to date Shen. But that wasn't a thing that worked out, and now he was just kind of... looking. "I kinda got to practice water rescue," Gar said, changing the subject back to his trip. Something slightly happier. Or maybe just a different type of sad. "Clarice held onto me while I was a dolphin. Which was pretty fun. I figure that might be an important thing to kinda know how to do."

"Oh, nice," Shen stated with a smile. She was going with the change of subject, absolutely. "We've got to do that in the lake some time! I'll drop the wings."

"We should," Gar said. "I... I didn't know how, when my parents died," Gar confessed. "I panicked. I ... might have been able to save them, but..." He sighed. It felt good to say it, finally. Because he never had before, to anyone.

"Oh, Gar." Shen rolled onto her side, drawing one of her wings up tight so it would be as comfortable as possible, and reached out to lay a hand on his arm. "You wanna tell me about it?" She didn't even really know how they had died.

"I mean, there's not much to tell," Gar said, shrugging. "There was... a river flood. We got swept downriver. I kinda panicked and just started turning into random animals. I think I ended up as an alligator. Crocodile, maybe? I dunno, it was just kinda vague in my head. I wasn't really aware of how bad things were until I got to shore, and found, uh, my parents..." He sighed. "It was maybe a half hour later? Maybe less. Maybe more. I didn't have a watch. It just felt like forever. They washed ashore, and I was too small to carry them, and I couldn't think of a form to move them, so I just... turned into something fast to run and get help from a village we'd been at nearby. They'd seen me, so, y'know. Not a big deal there. But..." He sighed. "I was just lucky they decided to be helpful to me and help get me back to the States." Back to the States? He'd never set foot in the States prior to that. Weird way of thinking, but whatever.

"I'm so sorry," Shen said, sympathy obvious on her face. She squeezed his arm gently. "Of course you panicked. Anybody would have." She couldn't even imagine having to see his parents like that. She had had it so much easier than him.

"I mean, it's not like they were great to me," he said. He'd made his peace with what happened before he even came to this school. Galtry had deserved worse than prison, in his mind. Or maybe prison was just fine for what he'd done. "But, y'know, they at least had tried to save me when I'd gotten sick. And then I wound up like this," he said, raising up an arm and looking at his own green skin. Funny how quickly he'd gotten used to it.

"Anyway. Sorry, I didn't wanna bring down the conversation. I just, y'know. There's a reason I wanted to know how to do that kinda thing."

Wow, there was a lot more shit there than Gar had ever let on before. "No, yeah, of course," Shen agreed, still frowning. "And it's great that you're learning. Definitely useful." She hesitated, then added, "But you know you can talk to me, right? About the not so good stuff. I don't care if it brings down a conversation or whatever."

"Yeah, but..." He sighed. "I never had anyone to talk about it with before. And like..." He waved a hand up at the sky. "All I had was myself. So I made do with that. And it's been, y'know, okay." Or maybe it hadn't been. He wasn't sure. It was hard to tell anymore.

"That's cool," Shen let him know, pulling her hand back and smiling at him. "You don't have to talk to me, or anyone. I'm just saying. If you ever want to."

"Maybe. It's just, y'know. I don't wanna be that kid who goes around and talks about how his parents died," he said. "Or about how his foster dad was a neglectful dick." Okay, yeah, maybe there was some vitriol in his voice, there, but he pushed it down. "I'd rather be happy. I owe myself that much. I owe it to people around me to be happy. Plenty of people have it worse, or just as bad."

"Owing it to the people around you is bullshit, I hope you know that," Shen pointed out. "But hey, your life, your grief. You ever change your mind, you know where to find me." She smiled hopefully over at him.

"I mean, to me, it's nothing more than my life story," he said, half-lying. Maybe he just had never really slowed down to think about it. He'd always been doing something other than moping. He'd had to, to stay alive. "And it's a huge freakin' bummer, so... I don't like bumming people out. I'd rather be, y'know, fun. Because it's also fun for me."

"Up to you," Shen stated easily. She really wasn't going to push, she just wanted him to know that he could talk to her.

"Yeah. I mean, maybe," he said, hesitantly. "I just, y'know. I... don't have a lot of experience just dumping on people." He didn't have a lot of experience with people, period. Even here he'd ended up being kind of a background person, always off doing his own thing...

"Here's some advice," Shen told him with a smile, switching back to laying on her stomach to make it easier on her wings. "Don't think of it as dumping on people. More like opening up. Sharing. Confiding in people. I mean, if I had a problem and I wanted to talk to you about it, would you think I was dumping on you?"

"Well, no," Gar said, making a face that was basically his Thinking Face. "It's just hard, y'know? Like, I spent most of my childhood alone," Gar confessed. "I mean, I had animals as company but it's not like I can talk to animals, really. And even if I could, it's not like animals understand people problems."

Shen nodded. "People are definitely a step up in that regard, yeah."

"I mean, I was in a trailer in the middle of the African wilderness for the longest time. And then after that I was in an attic." He shrugged. "I probably should've run away from Galtry. But he probably would've tracked me down, since, y'know, I was his cash cow." Which made him suppress the urge to turn into a cow.

"He kept you in an attic?" Shen's eyebrows had raised in incredulity. Who was this Galtry guy?

"Yeah. I mean, I got out a lot. Because, well, he didn't bother to make sure I was up there except when he checked, and you could set a clock by him," he said. "Just, y'know. He only hit me a few times before I turned into a polar bear on him. And then it was just, y'know, the attic."

"Who is he?" Shen asked, clearly horrified by the news.

"He was my legal guardian, after I lost my parents," Gar said. "He's in jail, now," he said, frankly. "When Xavier found me, it was, well, pretty easy for him to find out what was going on, and after that it was just a few phone calls, an interview with the police, and then Galtry was going to court and my testimony wasn't even needed; they had evidence he was embezzling my trust fund," he said. "I thought Galtry had been my parents' friend, and I think they thought the same, but he always talked about how jealous he was of my parents' work." He shrugged. "He's out of my life now. That's all I ever wanted, and Xavier gave that to me."

"I hope he stays there a long time," Shen said, a little darkly. Her expression softened. "I'm sorry you had to go through that." As if losing his parents hadn't been enough.

"Thanks," Gar said, glad to hear someone's sympathy. "I probably could've done more to protect myself, but, I mean, where else would I have gone?" he asked. "If not here, it would've been someplace else that was weirded out by me."

"None of it's your fault," Shen said, very firmly. "He's the only one to blame for this."

"I know," Gar said, nodding. "And he's in jail, so. It's over. And it's okay." Maybe it wasn't entirely okay, but it was okay enough.

"It's definitely where he belongs," Shen said with a frown, before it cleared into a slightly hopeful expression. "Wanna hug?"

"Like you have to ask," Gar replied, grinning just a bit.

Shen moved up to her knees, shifting closer to draw Gar into a hug, wings drawn up tight against her back so they wouldn't drag on the ground too much.

Gar shifted around to hug her back. It was nice, having her company. "Lemme know if you guys plan another rally," Gar said, smiling. "I might show, next time."

Shen chuckled at that, wings bristling, and gave him a squeeze. "That would be awesome. But I think I'm gonna take a short break from protest-planning right now."

"Fair enough," Gar said, smiling. "Probably best for my nerves, too. I don't think I could handle another rally too soon. Maybe in a few months."

"Yeah." Shen blinked a few times, making sure her eyes were dry, then squeezed him again before releasing him. "Maybe someone else can take it on next time. I don't know what to do now I'm not going to think about it every minute of every day." She pushed up to her feet, and held a hand out to Gar.

He took it and let her help him up. "Take some time for yourself; relax," Gar suggested, smiling. "In the meantime, you hungry?" he asked. "I got some tofu that I've been wanting to try a few different ways. You can lemme know what you think of my cooking," he offered, grinning.

"Sure, let's got MasterChef this tofu," Shen agreed with a smile.