thoughtformed | (no subject)

Come back in a couple weeks, I can feel the sophomore year six-inch growth spurt kicking in as we speak.

[He sizes Jason up for a couple more seconds, then turns and offers a shoulder for him to lean on.]

All right, let's get some espressos into you before you fall down.

Sophomore, huh?

[Jason takes a second to try and motivate himself before shifting his grip on the pole so he can throw an arm over Dave's shoulders, way beyond giving any shits about personal space. He's pretty damn heavy, sorry, and it doesn't help that he's carrying about 20 pounds worth of hardware. In the small part of his mind that's beginning to feel like it can care about stuff again, he's a little worried he's gonna crush this kid.]

I'm Peter, by the way. Let's, uh, start moving before the guards come out. They've been watching me for about an hour now and I'm not sure what they're waiting for.

[Dave stumbles a little but bears up gamely. He may be a beanpole, but he is a deified beanpole, thank you, and stronger than he looks.]

Dave. Did you do something to spook 'em? [He starts gently steering Jason down the sidewalk towards the nearest Starbox--there's basically one on every corner.] Non-fictional types can be such weenies.

Dislocated an orderly's jaw.

[Jason does his best to keep moving in as straight a line as he can.]

And I think I may have broken someone's wrist? Not sure, I was getting dog-piled.

[Dave chuckles.]

Way to make an entrance, dude. Sometimes I feel bad about how bullshit their lives must be, dealing with us.

[There's a Starbox right up ahead, but someone exits it--Dave himself, in street clothes this time, carrying two large cups of coffee in a cardboard cupholder. He heads over to them and hands them to Dave in exchange for a 'thanks, man.' The second Dave then looks at Jason and nods to the first.]

Tell him what you ordered, I'll remember it later. See you.

[And he vanishes back to the future from whence he came.]

[Jason's mind is moving way too slowly to deal with this.]

Maybe I am high.

[He roughly rubs his eyes then slaps himself but he doesn't feel any more awake than he did a second ago. It doesn't change what he just saw.]

I...sec.

[He rearranges himself a little so he can grab one of the cups. He pulls off the lid and starts chugging, realizing after he nearly chokes and spits out half his mouthful that it's fucking hot enough to burn. He turns his head and coughs weakly into his elbow, waiting for... really any part of this to start making some goddamn sense.]

I think that's, like, a duodectuple shot of espresso.

[Daave just lifts his eyebrows behind his shades.]

Is that legal?

[Jason ignores that.]

Did I just hallucinate that?

No time travel where you're from, huh.

Oh is that what that was.

I only use my powers for good. And to rake in hella tips. You wouldn't believe what people cough up for instantaneous deep dish delivery.

...I think I need to sit down.

[He lets go of Dave and sways alarmingly for a moment before stumbling over to fall into one of the chairs just outside the shop, then taking a really large gulp of the pure caffeine, damn, before setting the cup onto the table.]

[Dave follows and pulls a chair over from another table before setting the other coffee down in front of Jason.]

Don't drink that too fast. I've never seen a man's heart explode before and I don't want to start now.

[He looks...mildly concerned.]

You sure you should be walking away from the hospital and not, you know, going back in it?

I could be wrong but... now-you eventually got around to telling future-coffee-buying you what my order was so I guess nothing too bad ends up happening.

[Jason feels some of the fog lifting away, but it isn't anything near a caffeine buzz. Still, now he can focus some, and he pins Dave with a look as he sips a little more.]

Caffeine's a CNS stimulant and an antagonist to lorazepam. I need way more than 24 shots of espresso to counteract 16 fucking milligrams of ativan, but right now I'll just settle for 'not about to pass out'.

[And then... it wasn't as if he'd gotten all that fussed, but the slight irritation he'd managed to work up over the doctors tranq'ing him fades quickly, immediately, and takes with it what seems like all of his energy. With a weak sigh he drops his head onto the table with a quiet thunk and tries to hold on to wakefulness.]

Well, I mean, now-me will eventually just become future-me so I don't have to tell myself anything, but yeah, essentially that's how it works.

[Blah blah he's just talking to himself. After a second, Dave leans forward and tilts his head just to make sure Jason hasn't, like, actually died of caffeine poisoning or crazy ativan reactions or anything.]

Do you need me to go get my bro's car and take you somewhere? I mean, I only have a learner's permit, but I can almost guarantee I won't kill us both in a horrifying fiery wreck.

[Jason mumbles something but doesn't lift his head up so who knows what the hell he said. It sounded like, 'n'ere oo go'.]

Oooooor we could chill out here for a while until you can handle basic sentence structure again.

[He sits back and stretches out his legs.]

The cops've finally stopped picking me up for truancy, but they might get the wrong idea if they see me breaking into Bro's car on campus. In the meantime I can keep talking either to keep you conscious or lull you into the sweetest sleep you've ever known. Yea or nay, Pete?

[Jason summons all of his remaining willpower to drag the hand holding the coffee closer, only lifting his face when it's close enough for the edge of the cup to reach his mouth.

He finishes the drink and, barely, manages to catch his head with his hand so that's he's propping himself up that way instead of nearly passed out with his face smushed into the table. His eyelids are still droopy, though, and he's blinking a lot.]

Hey, I really appreciate all the help so far... you don't need to stick around. Sure you got better shit to do than...

[It takes him a second to replay the preceding moments of the conversation.]

Uh, than lull me into 'the sweetest sleep'.

[He smirks a little and offers a casual shrug.]

Dude, I'm a time traveler. I'm already doing all that better shit.

[It's why the police leave him alone when they see him during school hours. He's always already in class when they bring him back.]

Besides, I can't just ditch you in your doped up state. Miss Danvers would probably sentence me to an extra hour of P.E. every day for a year if I abandoned a civilian in need. So if you wake up enough to want the skinny on the island, I can serve up what deets as I can.

[Jason needs to hear this so he tries to rally himself, starting by roughly ripping the top off the second cup and taking a painful-looking swallow.]

If you're boyscout enough to want your 'help a violent stranger on psycho-drugs' merit badge then I'm gonna do my best to stay awake to oblige you.

[He tries to look attentive. He thinks it probably doesn't work.]

Please, I'm the most fuckin' boyscout. Bitches don't know about my Brownie points.

[It doesn't matter if Jason's attentive or not, really. Dave has a captive audience. The world is his oyster.]

This place is called New Moore. It's on an island, we don't know where. Everything seems basically Earthlike except weird shit happens on the regular. And by regular, I mean, like, every couple weeks we turn into pirates, or get invaded by bunny rabbits, or find ourselves married to our roommates. You know, just your average human interest story. Or whatever. There's a lot of people here, and some of them are, uh. Different.

Pirates, of course.

[Jason takes another sip, steels himself.]

Different how?

I'm guessing you're from some kind of Earth, right. No offense if I'm wrong, but you seem like a twenty-first century Earth kind of guy.

You pegged me.

Did your Earth have aliens? Or superheroes? Or ever get annihilated by meteors because of a computer game?