fandomhighdorms | Fourth Floor Common Room, Sunday Afternoon

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Fourth Floor Common Room, Sunday Afternoon

It was just that kind of day. Too warm outside to justify making it snow, too... too Sunday to justify actually putting any effort into anything at all. And Jack was bored.

So, really, that made it the perfect day for him to make his way into the common room for the first time, to see what all the fuss was about. It took a bit of poking at buttons, but he finally managed to figure out how to change the channel, and, after a few minutes of clicking through the stations, settled on pretty much the only show that wasn't an infomercial or an afternoon soap opera.

He wasn't entirely sure what those gummy bears were doing, kidnapping the minotaur luchador, but there was something to be said for watching a rocket-powered wrestling bovine bodyslamming the daylights out of the confectionery that slighted him.

Satisfied that he'd found the best thing on the television that morning, Jack settled in with a bowl of ice cream (because why not?) and contented himself to let his brains rot in front of the TV for the first time in his life.

[OOC: Because I would watch the hell out of a Burrito Bison cartoon. Yes indeed. Open!]

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"-- just stayed in the room, you know, no one forced you to follow," Natalie was telling the small red fox that was trailing after her, as she peered into the common room, drawn in by the noise of the TV. She had a jacket on, and looked like she'd been on her way to the roof.

But she felt this stop was warranted, when she saw what was on the TV.

"... What is that?"

Jack, who was still getting a feel for what sort of people around here could see him and which ones couldn't, was also coming to that point where he decided to err on the side of caution and just assume that everyone could. Worst-case scenario, he'd end up talking to himself, and it wasn't like he hadn't spent three centuries doing that already.

"It's a cartoon about a Mexican minotaur glam-wrestler who was kidnapped by gummy candy for some kind of crazy Candyland wrestling tournament," he offered, along with a little grin. "And I think he's trying to escape back to the convenience store he was grabbed from by launching himself into his captors?"

That sounded about right, anyhow.

"That's pretty crazy," Natalie said, her eyebrow still arched. "But I guess it makes about as much sense as anything that actually happens here on the island, and it's fiction, so."

Yeah, she could see him.

The fox at her feet, however, could not. So now he was giving her the fox version of a look that said 'really? you're talking to yourself now?'

Edited 2013-01-20 19:44 (UTC)

Well, Jack wasn't terribly interested in having a discussion with a fox, anyhow. The girl that could see him, on the other hand, was his new favorite person for the afternoon.

"It was either this, or some loud guy talking about car de-icer as though it was the most miraculous invention the world has ever known," he explained, with a wrinkled nose that summed up nicely just what he thought about that. "At least this way, they have some kind of amusing fight scenes when Burrito Bison faces off against the cops while the little candy people flee in terror."

"I can see how that would be preferable," Natalie replied, in her mild tone. She came further into the room, though, the fox following along and still looking weirded out. If a fox could convey such an emotion. "Better than commercials trying to sell you things you don't need."

"Yeah, the last thing on my list of necessities is de-icer. I mean, first off, I don't even have a car."

Yeah, that was the first thing turning Jack off of that. Followed by the fact that if the ice was there in the first place, odds were it was because he had wanted it to be.

"That'd make it pretty useless," Natalie agreed. "And there's other ways of dealing with ice."

The fox made an annoyed noise and she glanced down at him. "What?"

... But it wasn't like he could answer.

"Does your little friend down there have some kind of problem?" Jack regarded the fox for a moment, and then hopped down from the couch, crouching in front of Peter for a better look. "He's acting kind of weird for a fox. What's the matter, boy?"

Yeah, Jack was used to woodland creatures being able to see him. This was new and unusual, for him. Right up there with humans who could see him.

Peter the fox firmly ignored him. Natalie thought it was probably for the best, considering what a grave insult he would've taken it as to be called Natalie's 'little friend'.

And he hadn't even heard it, had he?

Natalie squinted at Jack. "Is there a reason why particularly fact-reliant people might not see you?"

Jack blinked up at Natalie, and then back down at Peter, and then pulled in a little breath as he reached a hand down to experimentally pet the fox.

... And watched the animal pass clear through his hand, that familiar numbness taking over his arm while his fingers seemed to explode almost into smoke, re-forming again when his hand was through to the other side.

"Your fox doesn't believe in me," he said, looking more confused than troubled by the whole... exploding smoke-hand thing. "He's a person, you said?"

Well. That was weird.

Edited 2013-01-20 21:14 (UTC)

Natalie's eyebrows climbed up a bit at the exploding smoke-hand thing, but since he didn't seem to mind, she decided it was nothing for her to worry about, either.

"He's usually a boy," she explained, skipping the teen soap declarations of how Peter wasn't her anything, as well as not usually being a fox. "It's a Fandom thing." At Peter's... mildly curious sound, she added, to him, "There's a guy here you can't see. I'm going to assume it's because you're not bothering to notice."

She looked up at Jack again. "Although, what was that about believing?"

Jack eyed the fox for a moment more, and then sighed and hopped back up onto the couch, reaching for his bowl of now melting ice cream. The moment it was in his hand again, the melting stopped, at least.

"I'm Jack Frost," he explained. "A legend, to most people. The ones who think I'm just a story can't see me, or touch me, or hear me. I might as well not be there at all. Hence..."

He nudged one of his bare feet at Peter's leg, and it dissolved into smoke all over again.

"You kind of get used to it after a while."

"You're Jack Frost?"

Well. That explained Peter, definitely.

"I'm not sure I should be able to see you."

"You don't believe in Jack Frost?" Jack's eyebrows were raising up on his forehead, and he was giving her a look that was a little more confused than before. "I am right here, about as real as I've ever been, I mean."

"I also don't believe in Santa Claus," Natalie pointed out in a perfectly neutral tone. "But if he was in a room with me, yes, I'd believe then."

Having dated a necromancer and played sister to a Shadowhunter, she'd grown pretty adaptable. She believed what she saw.

"We call him North," Jack offered, blinking at her. There was a weird, kind of twisty sort of logic that came with believing in what you could see, when that thing was invisible until it was actually believed in. But then... maybe it did give credence to there being more to the rash of sudden people seeing him here than he had thought.

Jack liked this place more and more.

"I... don't spend much time with him, though. The Sandman is the one I see around more often, actually."

It was hard to miss his dream dust, when Sandy really got going.

Natalie also thought anyone who couldn't see him had to either be new or far too attached to their pre-Fandom worldview.

Or too caught up in their own thing to care. Like Peter.

"And what's he like, then?"

Wasn't every day you got to ask that about the Sandman.

"He's quiet," Jack replied, smiling faintly. "He smiles a lot... and he's ancient. Not that he looks it. None of us really... look it."

Well, North had a white beard. But that was part of the legend, too.

"I think he's kind of what the rest of us want to be. So long as people dream, there he is."

"Mm." It was one of those things that made sense when you allowed yourself to accept the concept, Natalie supposed. And she had. "Do a lot of people here have trouble seeing you?"

"Probably more than half the people I've met so far," Jack replied, though he didn't seem upset by that. "I'm in classes where the other students probably think the teachers are crazy. Both of my instructors this semester believe in me, at least. That helps. Less than half is still way more than I'm used to, though."

"Personally, I don't understand how people can't see you." He was right there. How could their lack of belief override that? "But I have to say, there are classes at this school where the teachers appear crazy even when they're not talking to thin air."

Jack... really hadn't had anyone tell him about some of the island's weirder things, yet. Mostly because his big sibling couldn't see him, his roommate couldn't see him and he was new this semester too, and most of the other people he'd spoken to were too busy being thrilled that they were talking to Jack Frost, of all people, to worry about whether or not he knew his way around.

"Which teachers would those be?"

So, of course, he had to ask.

Natalie shrugged. "Well, Miss Pie is a pink pony who talks. I've never taken her classes but I've gotten the impression she's pretty... excitable."

That was an understatement, but she didn't know that.

"You don't know excitable until you've seen a little tooth fairy get excited over a lost baby tooth," Jack mused, looking thoughtful. "And a pink pony isn't all that weird. I know a six-foot rabbit with an Aussie accent and a boomerang that would like nothing more than to pelt me with brightly-colored eggs until I promise to never make it snow again."

Which wasn't something that was going to happen, Bunnymund.

"Well, that's a Fandom lesson for you, right there," Natalie said, foregoing the shrug this time although her tone implied it. "Weird is very, very relative."

"Apparently so," Jack agreed, giving Natalie a little smile. "I mean, you saw me right away, and your friend here, who is currently a fox, is still too skeptical to accept that Jack Frost might be sitting in front of him, eating ice cream on the common room couch while watching a Burrito Bison marathon on the television."

"Well, in his defence, I think Peter would prefer not to believe anyone would waste their time on ice cream and a Burrito Bison marathon in the first place," Natalie replied with a dry glance at the fox in question. Who saw nothing wrong with that statement, actually.

He was probably judging her for not doing something useful even now. "Whereas I've learned to separate what I think is possible in Fandom from what I think is possible where I'm from a while ago."

Dammit, Peter. So judgey.

"And... what do you think is possible in Fandom?"

Look, it kind of had to be asked.

"Everything."

She said it like it was a simple thing, too. But she'd seen the multiverse get pared down to just the inside of their library – so was there any better word for what was possible than 'everything'?

Edited 2013-01-21 13:49 (UTC)

"I definitely fit under the hood of 'everything,'" Jack decided, after a moment, with a little smile. "Good to know this place opens minds, I suppose."

He looked down at Peter, and then amended that statement somewhat.

"Most minds."

"He's a very busy and important man," Natalie deadpanned. It was equal parts a joke and the truth, and it was weird how that worked. "No time for fancies like legends. But, most people here aren't like that."

"Well, I look forward to meeting more of those people, then. And maybe even seeing what other impossible things happen around here."

He settled in with his ice cream, and then, a moment later, looked back up at her.

"You know, I don't think I ever did get your name."

"Natalie Adams," Natalie offered, pushing her bangs from her eyes. "Not particularly legendary anywhere."

Unless you were from further in the timeline in her world, in which case, well. It depended on the person whether the name would strike fear or lust into your heart.

"And the fox is Peter Wiggin, political consultant to the Republic of Haiti."

"Well, it's good to meet you, Natalie, legendary or not." For someone who gave off an aura of cold wherever he went, Jack's smile was actually pretty warm. "Since I can't really say the same for Peter, I guess I'll just have to settle for being satisfied that I know his name."

Politics really didn't impress him. Why should they? It wasn't as though that sort of thing ever touched him, after all.

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Fourth Floor Common Room, Sunday Afternoon

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