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It is a beautiful summer evening in New York, and despite having eaten a half-dozen hot dogs, Vic has talked Kellan into going back out for ice cream, because he's hungry, and it sounds delightful. "I want to try it," he tells him, "because I don't have a single bad memory of it. Can something really be that good?" He looks around the city as they walk. "This is my town," he says. "Can you believe it? Ha ha, I don't even have to be talking right now." He glances to Kellan, thinking at him, 'Is this right? I never told you what I can do and you told me. That's hardly fair.'
Not *every* meal and snack has to happen in another country, Billy figures. There has to be a teleporter/life balance that keeps one grounded. They might have had Indian breakfast for dinner in New Delhi, but they can have dessert down the street from home like normal people. Right? Right. Billy's in a pair of jeans and a tight light blue t-shirt, looking for all the world like the cat that ate the canary. He just can't stop grinning, for some reason, as he wanders along towards the ice cream shop with Teddy coming with. "Soo, what to have? Strawberry with chocolate sprinkles? Rocky road? The options, Teddy, the options. Hmm."
Not that it took much to twist Kellan's arm into going to get ice cream. He walks along next to Vic, hands in his pockets, grinning a little bit. "Yeah, it is that good. What flavor do you like best?" There's a little bemusement at Vic's wonder about the city and everything around him, but he's not listening in on his thoughts and the connection is severed, so he doesn't hear it, even when Vic is thinking at him. "I turned it off," he says. "For now." He's dressed in a pair of jeans with a white t-shirt and a dark green button-down shirt over it, looking a little more 50s today, for some reason. He says, "And are you gonna try something you know and remember, or try something new? Figure out if you have a favorite?"
It's starting to get hot so Teddy's in shorts, tee shirt and sneakers. "I want a sundae. Vanilla ice cream, hot fudge, whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles." Pause. "Or maybe a banana split. With vanilla ice cream, hot fudge, whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles." After a moment, he nods. "Yeah, that's what I'm having. And maybe a strawberry malt when we're ready to leave."
"I don't know," Vic admits. "I used to be a vanilla kind of guy, but I think I want to try chocolate." He eyes Kellan sidelong. "I'll just talk then." He's in jeans and a plain white tee a size too small, so the fabric stretches on him. "Maybe I should try all of them," he says, "to see if I have a favorite. Ugh, I just remembered, I don't have any money. You already paid for the dogs, so I hate being a freeloader, but I can pay you back once I get a job." As he draws nearer, he catches a snippet of this 'banana split' mentioned, and he says solemnly, "I know what I'm getting."
"I'm seeing a theme, Teddy." Billy grins over at his boyfriend (all the while trying very hard not to give him stares that make that obvious, since the 60's suck), "Vanilla ice cream, hot fudge, whipped cream, and chocolate sprinkles. I think the banana is just so you can pretend its healthy." He grins teasingly. Getting to the door first, he pulls it open and nods a friendly, dimpled smile over towards Vic and Kellan, holding it open for them, "Hey." he greets.
"You should do it. Try something you haven't yet to figure out if you like it," Kellan says with an enthusiastic and supportive grin. "It's cool. We can get something once you get your first paycheck. To celebrate. In the meantime, I've got this." He doesn't seem to mind. When they catch up to Teddy and Billy, Kellan grins as the door is held open and says, "Hey," in return with a friendly smile. Then he's sliding on inside and moving out of the way of the doorway so that others can enter, staring at the menu. "I think I'm going t try soemthing new this time.. I've never had.. butter pecan. Butter icecream? Sure, why not." He talks himself into it quite without needing anyone else to participate in the conversation.
"No, the banana is so I get more of everything without having to order two of them." Teddy replies with a grin. "I'm hungry." Course, he's usually hungry to some degree or at least he's never once turned down food. "Try whatever you want. Butter and nuts sounds good."
"Ooh." The moment he hears it, he knows. Billy nods to Kellan and gives him a look like all: you so wise. "Butter pecan is *amazing*. Get it with chocolate sprinkles." He pauses, "Well, that's what I'm gonna do, at least." He nods solumnly, and follows Teddy and the strangers in last, moving over to get in line.
"I'm so glad I ran into you," Vic says. "I had a good feeling." Billy gets a warm smile, which Vic then rounds on Teddy. "Hi," he says. He looks up at the menu board. "That does sound amazing. Maybe I'll try that next." He shoves his hands in his pockets to keep himself from fidgeting, and he walks the row of the ice cream display, looking at each flavor with intense interest. "Pistachio? It's green."
"Pistachio is amazing, too," Kellan says with a grin and then he nods to Billy, "With sprinkles. Gotta have some sprinkles." Because sprinkles are awesome. He laughs and says to Teddy, "I like the way you think. Any excuse to get more icecream sounds like a good excuse to me." He strolls along, waiting as patiently in line as one can wait with impending ice cream, until they finally get up to the front. Then he nods for Vic to order first, trailing behind to pay.
Teddy gives the two guys a quick grin then walks over to the counter to look over the selection, just in case he sees something that makes him change his mind. "I should just make a list and check off a different flavor each time I come here." he says to Billy. "But I think I'll stay with the banana split this time. I'm in the mood for one."
"Pistachios are delicious." remarks Billy to the strangers as he waits in line, "But, really, have you *looked* at them? They look like little alien fetuses." He turns a dimpled smile to Teddy, "That is a good idea: make it a mission, having it *all*." But then he nods to Vic and Kellan, "I'm Billy. This is my…friend, Teddy." He nods to the blond jock of jockitude.
The mention of alien fetuses catches Vic's divided attention, and he looks at Billy curiously. "I've never seen one," he admits. "I'm Vic. This is Kellan." Then he realizes the guy at the counter is waiting on him, and he says, "Oh! A banana split, please." He stands by, waiting on that split. "I like the way you think," he adds. "I'm going to try everything in this place."
"I kind of like the checklist idea. Should come back and order each one a different flavor, then we can speed up the trying them all process," Kellan says, instantly thinking of different ways and in different combinations, how to most efficiently consume all the various flavors that are on offer, factoring in those that are both seasonal, and rotating. And yet at the tsame time he smoothly orders, "Butter pecan with chocolate sprinkles." Vic introduces them while he gets out his wallet and then he nods to Billy and Teddy and says, "They're with us." Because they have now been assimilated into a group, like it or not. Kellan's decided. "I don't care what they look like," he says on the topic of Pistachios. "They're delicious, delicious alien babies."
"Hi there." Teddy smiles over at the other two, hanging back so he'll be last to give his order. "I'm pretty sure no one's seen an alien fetus outside a science fiction movie. He's just saying they look strange." Kellan's offer to pay gets a surprised look but he nods. "Nice of you."
Billy gets an odd look on his face for a moment, "How is it that two pairs of strangers run into eachother suddenly, and it turns out from all the options of flavors, we have *identical orders*?" He shakes his head at the unlikeliness of it all, and when Kellan adopts them? He shrugs, grins and nods, "Same for me. But now I'm going to have to return the favor sometime, Kellan. What do you think of paella?" He nods in agreement to Teddy's translating Billyish.
"Serendipity," Vic says with a pleasant grin. He thanks the counter guy when his banana split his handed over. "Where should we sit?" he asks Kellan, and he nods toward a booth for four with a questioning look. He doesn't wait for an answer. The banana split is so close to being in his belly he can't just stand there in the presence of temptation, so he heads over and slouches into the booth. He drums his fingertips on the table, trying to be polite and wait for the others.
Kellan seems to begin considering attempting to determine the probabilty of just that, his gaze lifting as though doing calculations in his head. He seems to catch himself though when Vic says Serendipity, and he laughs. "Yeah." Then he grabs his own icecream and spoon. He grins at Teddy and Billy and says, "Sure, no problem." Then he considers and says, "I don't think I've ever had paella.. I've heard of it but I'm not sure what it is." Then he's sliding over to the booth and dropping into it next to Vic.
Teddy orders his banana split, leaning a hip against the counter as he waits. "It's a lot of good stuff cooked with rice. Spanish. It's really good though it's hard to find a place here in the city that has it really good." That… didn't come out quite right.
"Paella…" Billy says, his tone sounding pious, even as he gets his sprinkled bowl of butter pecan, "Is a spanish rice dish. There's all kinds. I like seafood paella. I am a bad Jew." He flashes a grin, "Its… so much flavor and joy." He sighs, wistfully, and he waits for Teddy for a moment, but the ice cream! "Yeah for the *best* paella, you gotta go to Spain." He decides to head over and sit across from the other guys, and dig in. Teddy's slow! He needs to eat his ice cream.
"That sounds really good," Vic says, not that he's had a bad thing to say about food yet. The moment Kallen's parked, he dips his spoon into his banana split, and he lifts it to his lips. When he takes the bite, his features melt. Seriously, it's almost obscene, how blissed out he looks. "Oh my God," he says. "Oh my God oh my God." He quickly shovels in another spoonful. This time, he merely moans.
"See," Kellan says to Vic, pointing his spoon in Billy's direction. "Whole world outside of New York to get out there and see, whole world of cool food to try. That's why I want to travel around." Apparently this dovetailed into an earlier conversation between the two. Then he digs into his bowl of ice cream, taking a few bites and nodding, satisfied. The correct choice had been made. He grins over at Vic, watching him as he begins to devour the banana split. "So score one for banana split."
Teddy gets his banana split then goes over to slide in next to Billy. Vic is the recipient of a very strange looks given his reaction. Get a room, guy. "Umm, yeah. It's good." Not that he's yet tasted his own. Ah, good. Different topic. "Yeah, traveling is cool. It's great to see new things."
Billy eyes Vic for a long moment, and he bursts out laughing, "I think you and the banana split need some private time, guy." And yet, when he digs out a spoonful of sprinkled ice cream and tastes it, he blisses a little bit himself. "Yeah, travelling is great. We're lucky, uhh, my parents work for an airline so I get to travel a lot?" The lie is belied by the questioning tone at the end of the statement.
"I wouldn't trust me with this banana split alone," Vic says, unaware or uncaring how that might be taken. "Not that it's going to do so well here in front of everyone." Indeed, he's intent on putting the ice cream in the face. "I've never been outside of New York," he says. "But there's just so much of it, I can't imagine being anywhere else." He gets ambitious, spooning off a larger chunk of banana than the spoon can hold, and it teeters. He draws in a sharp breath, and the banana just sort of hovers there, only for a second. Then he quickly plucks it out of the air and stuffs it in his mouth. Oops.
"Yeah? Where's your favorite place to go?" Kellan asks Teddy with interest, taking another spoonful of icecream and popping it into his mouth. He grins a little over at Billy and then asks, when he's done swallowing, "You not sure?" Because that questioning tone seems a little off. It's out of the corner of his eye that he catches the suddenly levitating banana, and then he glances back toward Billy, Teddy, back again. Did they notice? His spoon hovers somewhere between his bowl and mouth. A bit of icecream falls back into the bowl with a *plop*
Teddy is just about to east his first bite of banana split when that piece of Vic's banana just hovers there in mid air till it's scooped up and eaten. Lowering his arm, he sets the spoon back in the dish and looks over at Billy. "You saw that right?"
"I don't have a favorite place— but Rome was fun. There's so much history and food." Billy is not sure how to handle the 'you not sure' thing, because despite being a spy, his tradecraft is awful. Lying just doesn't come naturally. Fortunately, a floating banana happens, and he blinks. He glances at Teddy, "Yep." And then grins at Vic, and letting go of his spoon, and it just floats there for a moment before Billy grabs it again. "Apparently we have some things in common besides being devastatingly handsome." His grin turns to dimples as his tone turns teasing.
Vic grimaces, and he looks so apologetic, like it's just so embarrassing to let one's telekinesis just hang out like that. But then Billy shows off his mojo, and Vic's look of impending dread turns to a sudden and relieved grin. Then he ducks his head and says, "Devastatingly handsome. I could get used to that." Then, without his hands, he lifts the cherry on top of his banana split to his lips, then he sucks it into his mouth and eats it. Looking around to make sure no one else saw is an afterthought. "This is so cool."
There are a few moments where Kellan just looks between all three others at the table, but when everything seems okay, he seems to become aware that he lost his icecream from his spoon, and goes digging about for more. Billy's watched with open curious interest, and then Vic is lifting the cherry right into his mouth and he gives him a little nudge with one shoulder. "Now you're just showin' off." He's just teasing, and his grin returns easily enough.
Teddy grabs the spoon and yanks it down to the table. "We're in public." he reminds everyone. And it's not even an emergency where they don't have much of a choice about it. Giving Billy a Look, he digs out some banana split and eats it before realizing that's Billy's spoon so he puts it in his dish.
Billy rolls his eyes at Teddy, "It was out of my hand for maybe a second. Relax. What, they're gonna ban us from the ice cream store for floating a spoon?" He spoons up some ice cream and enjoys it for awhile, then he looks back curiously to Vic, "So, telekinesis, huh? When did you first do it? I was on my roof and fell off and missed the ground." He grins a broad, dimpled grin.
Vic grins at Kellan and shoulder-nudges him back. "Yeah, maybe a little." He tucks into his banana split again, this time without the theatrics. Teddy's chastisement seems to have flowed over into Vic as well, because when he tucks into his banana split again, it's without theatrics. "Earlier today," he says. "I was pulling out an IV, and they had my hands restrained." He rattles this off like it's just one of those things a guy does.
Kellan glances around the shop but thus far no one in it seems to be paying attention to them over at their booth, all wrapped up in their own business. He goes back to eating his icecream slowly as Billy and Vic discuss telekinesis, but he can't help but glance over at Teddy thoughtfully, curiously, before he asks, "Do you do stuff too?"
"Because I grabbed it." Teddy counters but he seems to consider it a minor thing since he goes back to eating. At least until Vic mentions how he was drugged and tied up by someone. "You're not a clone made my some mad scientist are you?" Cause it's been done. Whatever happened to that guy anyway? Right, banana splot. Mouth full of ice cream, he just makes a noncommital sound in reply to Kellan.
"Wait, you just got it today?" Billy gives a surprised look at Vic, shaking his head, "That's unusual! Most people seem to get their powers somewhere around puberty. Then again, I didn't get any of mine until later myself. Then again I'm not a mutant, I don't think. Then again, I suppose I— wait, I think there's a limit of how many then agains you're allowed before you have to shut up." He turns a curious look to Kellan, "What about you?"
Vic shrugs a shoulder and says, "I got everything today." He glances to Kellan, apparently voting him the arbiter of what he should and shouldn't say about the source of, well, him. "But I'm not a mutant either, so, uh." He offers Teddy a small smile. "Not a clone, no. I was in the hospital."
The noncommital sound that Teddy earns him a continued curious studying, but that's until Billy asks about him. He nods his head, indicating that yes, he does stuff too, though he doesn't offer out what right away. When Vic looks over at him and seems to be looking to him for some sort of a response, he says, "Vic's a little complicated." Then he says, "Telepathy.. and a couple other things." He finishes off the remainder of his icecream, licking off the spoon.
Not a clone but in a hospital. Doesn't preclude the possibility of mad scientists being involved. "This isn't really the place to talk about it." Teddy points out. "We should just eat our ice cream and then go somewhere we can talk. There's a nice beach in Hawaii." he suggests, looking at Billy.
"Brother, my life shows up in the dictionary under the word 'complicated'. Right there, it says, 'Complicated: See Billy Kaplan, also Wiccan', as the last definition." Billy has to laugh softly and shake his head, and he sighs at Teddy's paranoia and shakes his head, "Yeah, sure." He noms on the ice cream, finishing it off— not that there was a lot left to begin with, then gives Teddy's shoulder a nudge, before grinning at the other two, "We shall fly Air Billy."
Vic doesn't need prompted twice to demolish the rest of his ice cream, and soon he's scraping the bowl for whatever remnants he can. "Hawaii?" he says. "I haven't been any further outside New York than Yonkers." He laughs a little and rubs the back of his neck. To Kellan, he says, "Not bad for my first day, huh?" He then glances to the other two. "What's Air Billy?"
Intense curiosity is written across Kellan's features as he listens to the conversation going on around him. Settling back into his seat in the booth, he studies Teddy, and then Billy, and then finally he looks over to Vic and says, "Yeah.. I'd say you've had one hell of a day so far." And it isn't over yet. There's a bit of a grin and then he says, "Sure, why not?"
Teddy doesn't really need a reason to eat quickly. It's more or less his modus operandi so he finishes his banana split then slides out of the booth. "You'll see." he tells Vic. "Though it doesn't involve air." That's just Billy being Billy.
Billy glances around a moment, considering, "I need a door. There's probably a side door in the alley." And with that, Billy is leading the way out of the shop and along down the street towards the alley at the side of the building. "See, telekinesis is just a … thing. Really, I'm a boy-witch." And with that he finds the nearest door, lays his hand on it and concentrates, "Party at the beach" He concentrates harder, closing his eyes, "Party at the beachpartyatthebeachPARTYATTHEBEACH" And… nothing happens.
Then Billy tugs open the door that is mysteriously no longer locked, and through the other side of it? Is a beach. With a bonfire, and a cooler, and a pile of towels. To that, Billy looks surprised. "Uhh…" And he steps through the door, the very instant he crosses the threshold he finds himself in a pair of swim trunks instead of his usual clothes. This startles him all the more. "… the spell went a bit farther then I intended." Apparently 'party' was emphasized a little too much.
Vic steps through after Billy, and he looks down at himself as he too finds himself in trunks. "How far was it supposed to go?" he asks, looking up at Billy with big eyes. He wiggles his toes in the sand, then laughs. "We're in Hawaii!" He moves further onto the beach so as not to block the doorway. "Oh, wow. Wow, this is the most amazing thing I've ever seen."
Kellan follows along with the others, watching with interest as Billy places his hand on the door. He studies both Billy and the door and when nothing happens, his brows knit together in thought, but then the door opens and. Wow. Blue eyes widen and his mouth opens, "Damn! That's … whoah." He follows through and on the other side he's in a pair of swim trunks. He laughs and says, "Well that's funny, and cool, though I kind of liked that shirt… Do I get it back on the way out? Wait, how do we get back? WIll the magic know what we were wearing before? Am I going to end up back in New York in swim trunks? Are we actually in Hawaii?" The stream of questions may not in fact end.
Teddy hangs back again so he can follow the others through and close the door behind them. And if he uses his position behind them to check out the suddenly half naked guys… it's what guys do. "Beer in the cooler?" he asks, not sounding shocked or surprised at all. "Where'd you put their clothes?" Next to the dinnerware, probably. "We're actually in Hawaii." he assures them as his sneakers and shirt just get absorbed into his skin.
"It… was just supposed to be a wormhole." Billy seems embarassed by the spell … oddity, "It wasn't supposed to conjure any of that…" He waves at the bonfire and cooler, "… or include a clothes filter in the actual transit." He stares at Kellan's stream of questions with a growing sense of alarm, "I… don't know. I'll, uh, reimburse you for your clothes if, like, they don't come back." He blushes more at Teddy's question where the clothes are, and he shrugs helplessly, then answers more with a nod to Kellan, "When we're ready to get back I'll have to open another wormhole." On the question of beer, he heads over, pulls open the cooler questioningly, and what is found is? Is not beer. It is instead hard lemonade. That's sorta beer-ish, right?
While Kellan peppers Billy with questions, Vic just takes it all in. "Do you smell that?" He breathes in deeply. "That's the smell of not being in New York." He ambles after Billy toward the cooler (and checks him out, which will be extremely awkward later). "Is it safe to talk here?" he ventures. "I mean it seems like we're the only ones on the beach."
"Oh, don't worry about it," Kellan says about the clothes, "I was just.. curious." But the questions do finally stop when he sees Billy's embarassment and slight alarm. Instead he clears his throat a little bit and wanders over toward the cooler, and then on past it, looking around the beach, letting his feet sink into the warm sand. Eventually he turns around back toward the others.
Teddy turns in place to look around then shrugs. "Seems okay. But even if someone out here sees us, it's not a big deal. We don't live here." Granted, Manhattan is a big place but it's home territory and he doesn't like taking chances. Walking over to the towels, he grabs one and gives it a shake to settle down onto the sand. "And to answer your question, yeah. I do things too."
To Vic, Billy grins, "Oh, there's this great restaurant just outside Berlin where we went to dinner recently, you should try it— ah, when I mentioned my parents work at airlines? Not so much. We 'eat out' on a scale that is, I admit, slightly an absurd abuse of magic." Billy looks around slowly, responding on the matter of safety to talk, "I wanted a beach with privacy, so its almost certain no one is nearby. Of course, if someone was coming by and heard us talking, well… we'll be back in New York before too— oh crap." He looks around and frowns, wincing, "There's no doors, Teddy."
Vic goes to the towels after Teddy and follows suit, more or less mimicking him. He settles down on the towel and looks to Kellan. "Hey, you should see the weird drinks they have in the cooler," he says. He rolls onto his stomach, propping himself up on his elbows. "Does a doorway work?" he asks. "Could you make one out of driftwood or would it need to be a proper door?"
Kellan wanders over toward the cooler to look at what is inside and he grabs one before grabbing a towel for himself and dropping it down into the sand. He settles there, crosslegged and stares at the bottle in his hand for a moment, "Did anyone bring a bottle opener?" Then he gets up again and goes to search around the cooler, finally finding one with the party supplies. "Your magic has excellent forethought." Then its back with his opened bottle to his towel he goes, settling once more.
"So make one." Teddy tells Billy, nodding toward Vic. Though he's not talking about driftwood. "A door and doorframe. Or a wardrobe. No big deal. Though do you really need a door or just an opening? Does an archway work? How about a hole in the ground? Can you trace out an outline in the air?" He never has explored the limits of Billy's portals since there's always been a door around.
For his part, Billy doesn't use the bottle opener, he takes up the hard lemonade and just peels the top off with telekinesis. He spreads the blanket out, and explores the cooler a bit more— and finds supplies for smores. "Huh. I got us smore-stuff. I… this is the weirdest spelling ever." Looking between Vic and Teddy at the questions, eh shakes his head uncertainly, "Remember I'm new at this, Teddy." He nods to Vic, who wouldn't know that ahead of time, but now does, "I don't *know*. The first couple wormholes I did, didn't have doors. But they tended to stay open — I couldn't figure out how to close them. Or, they made me throw up from the strain. The door is… a way to focus my mind. To get a predictable effect." Pause, "Usually." He looks to Vic then, curious, "So, what's complicated?"
"There are worse places to be stranded," Vic says, grinning as he kicks his legs idly. He watches Kellan to see his response to the hard lemonade, letting him be the taste-tester. "Okay, wow, so. Complicated. He looks between Billy and Teddy, then to Kellan. "So, long story short, I was kind of born today. This body belonged to someone who was a vegetable. He was pretty much a brain stem keeping his heart beating and all that stuff. So, uh. Yeah. Happy birthday to me."
"So he just kind of popped into being, I guess. We don't know who his parents are or where he came from, but out of the blue he was just.. there, and then he took over.. Vic's body, so he's Vic-Not-Vic sort of.. " Kellan says. He takes a sip from the bottle of hard lemonade and for a moment there's a bit of a pucker, and then eh tries another sip and he nods. Seems alright. He's quiet though, as the talk is of opening wormholes and Vic's unique situation.
Teddy pulls a bottle out of the cooler, looks to see what it is, then pulls off the bottle cap. Brow furrowed, he looks at Vic. "So you…" He's not even sure how to finish that. "Where were you before that?" But then he looks over at Kellan when he seems to know what's going on. "How do you fit into this? Did you know Vic? The real Vic?"
Billy tilts his head to the side, looking at Vic for a long moment, his eyes seeming oddly unfocused, "Oh. Hey, wait, I can see it. There's magic around you, or magical residue: I can't quite make out what it did, its faded too much, but… huh. My magic isn't like anyone elses. Well, except my Mom. So sometimes its hard to tell what regular magic people are doing." He nods to Teddy's question, and takes to watching Vic, "But you're not an infant— you obviously have a fully developed mind. But the guy whose body you're in … was basically braindead? Where's the mind come from?" Not that Vic might even know, but he's curious.
"Oh, I met Kellan just before we went out to ice cream," Vic says. "He bought me hot dogs." He flashes Kellan a smile. Besties! "The only thing I remember before waking up in this body is movement, like running only with no legs. Then a pulling, and then I was opening my eyes in a hospital bed." He scratches his head as he says, "The funny thing is I'm thinking his thoughts but they're not like they're mine. Like watching a movie from inside the movie. So, yeah, I know Vic never went any further than Yonkers, and he was a criminal, and some guys beat him to death in prison. I know how he spoke, what he knew. But the only thing I really remember, like it happened to me, started this morning." He smiles at Billy. "Maybe I'm the mind. I don't know. You can sense magic? That's so cool."
"We met at a hot dog stand," Kellan says when he's asked how he figured into this. "We got to talking and he had some odd answers to some questions so I read his mind." He's as unapologetic about it now as he was then, shrugging his shoulders a little bit with a grin. "I was curious. We got to talking. Then, ice cream. The rest, you know." He shakes his head, "I'd never seen him before, the old Vic. Though since he was in prison that kind of stands to reason."
Teddy looks from Kellan back to Vic then over to Billy. Yup, not just way outside his experience but also anything he can think of so he's not even going to. Leaving the magic to Billy, he takes a seat on the towel then stretches out, leaning back on his elbows.
"I can *see* magic. Not like anyone else does: what mom and dad describe in their seeing of magic is completely different. There's fragments of equations on your skin, that are sort of soaking into you. I can make out some and know vaguely what they mean— one seems to be defining the scope of an area, focusing on its limiting factors. But most I can only see fragments of. And its so faded that I have to look for it to see it." He shrugs slowly, "All the things I can do— its not magic, or at least, my dad says its not and he's… uh." He pauses, waffles on how to express this, "The guy in charge of magic in the world." is what he decides on. "I manipulate reality. I want the world to be a certain shape and it ends up that shape." He pauses, and adds as aside to Teddy, "Oh. I talked to him. He said you being in the Mirror would be too dangerous for us both. It has to be me alone." Then to Kellan, "Besides telepathy, do you have other tricks?"
Kellan seems entirely fascinated as Billy describes what it is that he can do. He continues to sip at his drink until he forgets about it entirely as he focuses on this reality shaping power. He gets lost in thinking about all of the various possibilities that such a power could create. Then he says, "Oh, yeah.. I can split my mind up and perform multiple mental processes at once, and I can split myself into copies, reflections, of myself, and they can all do separate things at once — like do my homework, a separate copy doing chores, another one at football practice." Not that he looks like he's ever played football. It's more probably an example of what's possible rather than an accurate accounting of what he's done with it.
Vic rests his chin on his hands and listens to Billy with interest. "Wow, you're a heavy-hitter. Your parents must be powerful, too. Maybe they can help me find mine. I think I was made" Then he listens to Kellan, and his brows lift. "That would be such a timesaver," he says. "And would've helped with some of those B&Es Vic did. He might've kept out of juvie. Nng, I have to get used to saying I." He steals a glance Teddy's way. "Do you want to talk about what you can do? If you don't, that's fine."
Teddy looks over at Billy at mention of the mirror. They can talk about that later. "Now that's useful." he sys to Kellan. "I've wished I could be in two places at once lots of times." Oh, right. He never mentioned what he could do, did he? Sitting back up, he shrugs at Vic. "It's not a secret." Pause. "Well, actually it is so nothing gets said to anyone else, of course. All of us. Anyway, I'm a shapeshifter."
The thing that comes to mind when Kellan says what he can do? Billy blurts it out, "Is it still masturbation if you—?" he leaves that hanging, grinning dimpled as he does. He then shakes his head at Vic, "Its not as impressive as it sounds." he admits, "And… weird stuff happens sometimes, and I can't do like anything and sometimes what I try to do other things happen." He winces, embarassed. But he nods more seriously, "I'll take you to see Dad. If anyone knows where to start looking for what happened to you and how you got this way, its him. He's sort of … in charge. Being hired for the Pointiest Hat job makes him both in charge of defending reality against eldritch horrors, random weird sutff, and also makes him the most powerful mage on the planet. If anyone can figure out who made you and how you are, its him. Also he just knows practically everything." At this, his sigh is long-suffering. Having the Sorcerer Supreme as a dad has certain positives but also a couple negatives. He adds absently, "He's the *best* shapeshifter." in a corrective tone.
Vic cracks up. "Billy," he groans. He rolls onto his back and splays, heedless of the sand. He'll learn to regret that. "It'd be cool to meet your dad," he says. "I hope he won't think I'm an eldritch horror. I just kind of like being Vic. Vic gets ice cream." He grins over at Teddy when Billy declares him the best. "What's your favorite shape?" he asks.
"Shapeshifting is pretty cool," Kellan says to Teddy with a grin. "What kind of shapes? Animal shapes? Alien shapes? Strange spooky monster shapes?" Questions, he always comes back around to the barrage of questions, though when Billy blurts, color goes right up his cheeks to his ears and he coughs a little, sputtering the hard lemonade he'd just taken a sip of. He coughs for a little while, trying to get the lemonade out of his lungs. It takes a bit before he finally stops. Then he just falls silent, listening to the others talk about Billy's dad.
Teddy can't help but look a bit shocked at Billy's question. He hadn't even thought of that and certainly wouldn't have asked. Shapeshifting. Yes, good. Moving on. "My favorite? I don't really have one. Well, I guess my Hulkling one since I use it the most." Vic gets another shrug. "Whatever works."
Billy *totally* thought of it instantly: if he could split in two, why… but better yet, if Teddy could? He looks distracted for a long moment as certain very naughty possibilities fill his thoughts. Any telepaths nearby might have difficulty NOT reading the intensity of those surface thoughts. Or maybe they don't have a problem with stray thoughts. He says absently, "Hulkling is big and green and superstrong and supertough." by way of explanation that Teddy does not give. He waves away Vic's worries then, "You're not an eldrich horror. I don't know what he'll think of this possession thing, but obviously you're a sentient, thinking, feeling being, and the body wasn't in use— so I expect he might mildly disapprove at worse but see there's no actual harm to it. He's a reasonable guy, Vic. Though he seems seriously put out with me willing alien spider monsters into non-existance and I'm not clear still on why that's a problem. I'm pretty firmly in the 'anti-alien-spider-monsters' camp."
Vic glances sidelong at Kellan and grins as he sees the color in his cheeks. "Yeah, he knows," he says to the others. He nudges Kellan companionably with his foot. "The doctor told me there should be no coming back from how bad off the guy was," he says. "He was deteriorating." His features fall somewhat. It is a rather sad story to have rattling around inside one's head. For what it's worth, I didn't really have a choice. It just happened." He nods at the explanation of a Hulkling, and he studies Teddy anew, tilting his head. "Maybe he's just being a Dad," he asides to Billy. "They get weird ideas. Wait, alien spider monsters?"
There are some surface thoughts that are loud enough that they can't quite be ignored, even when he is not actively listening, per se, and the color that is in his ears and his cheeks does not abate. Kellan does, however, regain enough control to pick up his drink and focus on that while the others talk. He shoots Vic a look, and a smirk, and then he says. "I'm going for a swim." He sets his bottle down in the sand just enough so it doesn't tip over, and then he pulls himself up and begins to head off toward the water, quickly.
"So did Vic have family?" Teddy asks. "Parents? Are you going to try getting in touch with them?" He's not really Vic but then again, he's the only Vic there is and if the hospital tells them he came out of his coma and walked out…
Billy eyes Kellan, and says loud enough he hopes the guy hears, "Alien *crystal* spider monsters. They show up, kidnap people after killing a couple people, leave. I'm…" Billy hesitates, "Okay, so, like. They're bad. They're from another dimension and no one quite knows what to do: and I have a sample of their body that I've been studying it…" He hesitates, then shrugs, "Look, Teddy and I— Hulkling and Wiccan respectively— are part of a team. The Contingency Plan. We save the world, when Plan A misses the mark or is busy. And… I was thinking of leading a recon mission. To find out what they want the people for, if they're still alive, and what can be done to shut this situation down. People are dying. Someone has to act. The Avengers don't seem equipped to counter a transdimensinoal threat, and I am pretty sure I can open a wormhole to where they come from." Is he trying to sell a recruitment? He is indeed.
Vic grins at Kellan without a stitch of shame. "Don't drown," he calls after him. His gaze lingers on Kellan until he's in the water. Vic may have been violently straight, but nuVic is clearly a more open-minded sort. "Nah," he tells Teddy, "his parents are dead, and he was bounced around in foster care. He's got a lot of friend and acquaintances around town, but no one he'd call close." His smile returns, if somewhat subdued, and he says, "Vic was going to go straight after he got out of prison. Maybe becoming someone who fights crime will be a good way of honoring him."
Kellan wanders down to the water, wading in up to his knees. He can still hear them talking from where he is, the sound carrying despite the sound of the tide rolling in and out. He glances back over his shoulder and says, "I'm fairly against transdimentional arachnids, myself. There's enough of th regular kind here as it is." He gives Vic a thumbs up, no plans on drowning.
"Let's have some smores and more uhh, hard lemonade, and chill. And maybe meet up tomorrow to talk serious about transdimensional crystal spiders, if you're interested in helping." suggests Billy. "Come to Planner Base. Which… is Teddy and my apartment. I'll bring paella in from Spain and see who else of the team can show up."