bigapplesauce | HANDYSPLOSION [open to multiple]

Current Mood: shocked
Current Music: April 8, 2013

Entry tags:

HANDYSPLOSION [open to multiple]

Andrew is snooping, but he's not getting very far with it. The trouble with absurdly powerful, government-sanctioned entities is that getting inside the base of such an organization tends to be a bit more complicated than showing up with a forged Health and Safety ID card. Of course, he could probably get inside very easily if he simply went up to the front doors and announced himself, but somehow he doubts he'd be likely to come back out without making a grand production of escaping, and he doesn't want to be too late coming home and make James worry.

The other trouble with Romac is that they're too smart to have anything interesting going on outside. After quite a bit of loitering -- more loitering than is probably wise -- all Andrew's seen is fairly ordinary people going in and out of the building. Disgruntled at their failure to be even the least bit interesting, Andrew finally gives up in disgust and decides to walk to the rebel base in order to say hello to a few people and use their private library.

He makes it less than halfway to the park before disaster strikes. Later, Handrew will be mortally embarrassed that the crisis didn't come about because some Romac agent spotted him and decided to make trouble, or because he had to run to intercept an alien, or even because someone got it in their head to mug him. No, this disaster occurs simply because neither Andrew nor a certain speeding taxi driver happens to be looking in the right direction at the right time. As the meta-crisis steps out into the intersection of Lexington and 59th (against right of way, if he'd bothered to notice), there's a deafening screech, an impact, and Andrew quite unexpectedly shatters.

The reflex to use his power when surprised likely saves his life. Twelve tiny Andrews are scattered across the road a moment later, all of them stunned to one degree or another. As they recover and realize what's happened -- and hear the yells of a few people who saw -- they all take the same course of action:

Run.

Unfortunately, very few of them run in the same direction. There's no plan or pattern to it, and very quickly the Andrews scatter to the four winds -- or at least to the four corners of the intersection. There are a few shouts (even New Yorkers tend to notice when someone explodes next to them) and one person even stoops and tries to grab one of the four-inch-tall Andrews, but he has quite a bit of experience in running for cover.

[OOC: Let me know where you want to encounter one or more Andrews, and I will write up an explanation of how he got there. The accident occurred at E. 59th St. and Lexington Ave. (the game map might help you here), and the Andrews have gone in every direction. Some Andrews will take advantage of the nearby subway entrances; depending where he enters he could do as he intends and go northwest, or he could get on the wrong train and go northeast, which would take him past Romac housing. Really, anything is possible -- though he's trying to get to either the Rebels or the TARDIS, he could get lost in any direction, or stay stranded near the intersection. Just write a tag indicating where your character encounters an Andrew and I'll work it out (or you can PM me or ping me on AIM if you want to hammer it out together). He'll be staying in twelfths, since merging into sixths would make him a foot and a half high, meaning he'd be still too small to get around without trouble but too big to go unnoticed. There might be multiple Andrews traveling together, so let me know if you want two of them.]

UPDATE, November 14: Nine Andrews are accounted for so far. One Andrew each currently reserved for Lucy, Spike, and Topher, meaning no more Andrews are available.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

At this point in his day, Edgar doesn't even blink at the news that there are other other Andrews out there (or at least there had been). The absorbing part does get a few startled blinks from him, though. How unexpected.

He has no problem with the idea of needing to carry a larger Andrew back to the TARDIS, if need be. They can't be too terribly far away now, anyway. But he has to be able to tell Andrew so. With a pointed glance toward Daine (just in case she needed to provide encouragement and/or reassurance), Edgar holds out his free hand to Andrew.

Daine's inclined to go for the merging idea, too. Even if Andrew grows another foot, he'll be small enough for her and Edgar to manage him without too much trouble. The littlest Andrew's state is what really has her worried; she'd rather have one of him in a slightly less alarming condition than have one who's fine and one who's all but comatose.

When Edgar holds his hand out, Daine looks up at Andrew and wags her tail encouragingly. Just in case he really needs a clue, she raises one of her forepaws and waves it in Edgar's direction. ~~Go on, shake paws.~~

Andrew, for his part -- at least the larger Andrew -- is less gung-ho about the idea of merging. It's not that he's not worried about the smaller Andrew, far from it, but that merging his way into a head injury will mean he might well be utterly useless and helpless. Daine he trusts, but whether he's ready to entrust himself to her and Edgar in the hopes they won't get spotted and stopped by an agent of ROMAC (or just a concerned citizen in general) is another question.

"What?" he asks, looking between Daine and Edgar's outstretched hand. Why doesn't Edgar just talk to him -- or sign like earlier? What is it he wants?

"Hafta touch him," says the tiny Andrew, watching the goings-on through slitted eyes and realizing in a moment of clarity what's missing from this exchange. The bigger Andrew starts, eyes flicking down to his smaller self, then quickly sticks his hand in Edgar's.

Sorry, Edgar starts. I'm mute, and it's a lot faster to talk this way than it is for me to write things down. Oh, and I'm sorry if I sound like someone you know, he tacks on, to get it out of the way. It'll stop eventually.

He gives the smaller Andrew - who looks like he's clinging to consciousness by his fingernails - a worried glance.

I think you two should recombine, he says, somewhat bluntly. If it doesn't go as well as we hope for you, I can carry you back to the TARDIS, no problem. But traveling like this is going very badly for him, Edgar finishes, nodding toward the Andrew still in his hand.

Edited 2013-11-25 00:16 (UTC)

Maybe Daine should have thrown her paw on the pile, too; she has no idea what's being said. Even if she can't contribute to the conversation, at least she could hear both side of it. Belatedly, she sits on the steps and puts her paw on Edgar's wrist, sending him her confusion even as she looks to Andrew for a translation.

"He wants me to combine," explains Andrew with a glance at Daine. His mouth sets into a hard, worried line as he looks down on the smaller Andrew again. "Andrew --" he starts to ask, but the other one doesn't look up or even open his eyes in response to his name. For a split second Andrew is afraid the other one has stopped even breathing -- and even as he sees the little chest move and reassures himself that the situation isn't that dire in the next moment, he knows he's come to his decision.

He nods, not at all happy about it but compelled to agree. "I'm going to sit down," he tells Edgar, "And then I need you to hand him -- no, just hold him out so I can put my hand on him, that should work."

Looking around to make sure they're not being watched, he breaks the connection and sits down on one of the steps, leaning back to sort of lounge against the wall and the steps above and stabilize himself as much as possible.

Edgar's relieved for the smaller Andrew, but worried anew for the bigger one. Soon to be the singular Andrew, he supposes.

Once the bigger Andrew has settled himself on the steps, Edgar throws a few signs to Almondine, who climbs to the step just below the one Andrew is on and sits beside him. She leans lightly against his shoulder for support, should it be needed.

Edgar seats himself on the same step, by Andrew's legs. Then he carefully lowers his hand until the Andrew there is about chest level with his larger counterpart.

With Almondine there to lend Andrew some additional support, Daine resigns herself to keeping a lookout for any nosy two-leggers who might be passing by. She doesn't like turning her back on Andrew, despite her awareness that he likes to have some privacy (or he does when he's thinking about it), but needs must. Her eyes scan the crowds outside for gawkers, but her ears are trained on the Andrews.

Let me know when he's done, please, she requests of Almondine. She doubts Andrew's bashfulness would extend to a real dog, given he seems to forget she's watching whenever she's in animal shape.

Andrew gives Almondine a faint smile -- he doesn't know her, but presumably she's a good sort. He glances past Daine, uneasy about the possibility that someone will see what they're doing and get curious. There's nothing for it, though, but to try to get through it before that happens.

"Allons-y," he says with a slightly shaky breath, reaching gingerly for Edgar's hand. Looked at one way, he's saving himself. Looked at another, he's about to hit himself rather hard in the head. Andrew winces and very gently puts his fingers against the chest of his smaller counterpart, trying to ignore the way the other's breath catches despite his efforts not to press. It's harder without the other able to concentrate on the task of merging, but at least the littler Andrew isn't resisting, and after a moment his tiny form blurs into Andrew's hand and Andrew's form swells to a whopping height of 4'1" (or would, if he weren't partly curled up on the steps). He lets out a groan as he's simultaneously hit with a headache that wasn't there before and experiences his headache bleeding off to be much easier to bear than it had been. Sagging down onto the steps, he tries -- something he needs to do, brain, memories, how does he --

"Wha..?" he huffs, confused and frustrated with his confusion. Everything is clear now, and everything is an indecipherable whirl. The two perspectives are refusing to merge, but the influence of the injured Andrew is muddling him too much to allow him to go through his usual compartmentalization exercise.

It never occurs to Edgar to look away, so he watches, fascinated, as the Andrews merge.

It's clear right away that while the joined Andrew isn't in as bad a shape as his smaller version was, he still isn't doing all that well. Edgar isn't sure what he can do to help, so he just sits and waits.

Almondine, meanwhile, looks toward Daine, who has her back to them, and lets out a short, soft whine of concern.

Daine turns back around at Almondine's whine, and suppresses one of her own when she sees Andrew sprawled on the steps. He does look a lot better than the little one did, but he still doesn't look very good.

She reminds herself that the memory-sorting takes a little while - and that it might take longer than usual this time because the little Andrew had it so rough. Whatever his memories are like, it won't be any easy task to make sense of them. Climbing back up the steps, she sits above Almondine and gently rests a paw on Andrew's shoulder, waiting for him to recover himself.

It's a major improvement over how things were a moment ago, but at the same time Andrew feels like he's just been hit by a truck. He cracks open his eyes to see that he's surrounded by concerned faces, mainly canine, and shuts them again with a sigh. "We're okay," he says, trying to reassure them. "It's a jumble."

Edgar reaches out to lay his hand over Andrew's, but hesitates. He isn't sure whether having his voice in his head would be worse for Andrew or not. Finally, he decides to go for it.

Placing his hand over Andrew's, Edgar thinks. Take your time. We can wait until you're ready.

How many is this, now? She found three... one got to the TARDIS on his own... Aly's got one, Edgar found one, so that's six. It's a bit hard to tell how tall he is at the moment, but she doesn't think he's quite as big as he was when he was only split in two. Which means that even if the addition of Aly's Andrew brings him up to that size, they've still only accounted for half of him.

Drat. She's beginning to suspect she won't be able to gather up the rest of him before she's forced to stop. For a moment, she considers just leaving this Andrew in Edgar's care while she resumes searching on the wing... but no. Much as she trusts Edgar and Almondine to look after him as well as she could, this Andrew is confused enough without her leaving him with a near-stranger.

Maybe the Doctor will have made some progress with the TARDIS by the time they get back. That failing, she's still got two dogs - three dogs, counting Almondine - who could help try and sniff him out. If she has to take two-legger shape and search the park on foot with Sarge or Molly, so be it.

Edited 2013-11-26 03:05 (UTC)

Andrew starts as the voice of Peri thunders through his head, but even by the time Edgar finishes his second sentence, that part of Andrew's brain that has heard him multiple times resolves it into the blended voice he'd started to associate with the boy.

"They'll notice," objects Andrew. "Pedestrians. We can't stay here."

Score one for decent coherence? At least he understands where they are now. Trouble is, he's still confused about how many of him there are. "I can carry me from here," he suggests, thinking that him carrying his little self would be the quickest way for them to get out of here -- and that it would be nice to be carried. And if something goes wrong, well, he can always merge.

Edgar frowns. You've already merged, he gently reminds Andrew. Do you remember?

He throws a worried and uncertain look Daine's way. She knows Andrew much better than Edgar does - does it normally take a while for him to remember everything that happened with a merge?

Daine's not very pleased with that slip-up, either, and she lets out a low whine. It might take him a while to sort things out, certainly, but this is the first time he's ever seemed to have forgotten that he merged at all.

Well, he's right about one thing: he can't just stay sprawled here. If they can at least get him moving in the right direction, that would be something. The park is only a few blocks away; at least there will be fewer people to gawk at them there.

She lowers her head so she can wedge her nose behind his shoulder and give him an encouraging nudge. It's not a hard enough push to force him up, but at least it ought to get the idea across.

There's still blood and bruises, too -- nothing like how he looked when Edgar was carrying him around, but compared to the Andrew that came here with Daine he's looking significantly worse for wear. His trouser leg has partially mended itself, but little rips and tears and scuffs have appeared on his clothes from where he was kicked into the bushes. All in all, he's more noticeable than he would want to be.

He gives Edgar a confused look. But he -- "Oh," he says, then looks at his hand like he's expecting to find that he's holding himself anyway. "I did. Yes, that's right -- quite right, Daine, we should be going. I can walk, just don't let me get stepped on. Help me up, Edgar?"

No point arguing with him, really, because he's already climbing to unsteady feet. He's aware his head still isn't right, but he knows it's not safe to stay here.

Edgar, however, has other ideas and gently guides Andrew back down to the step.

Let's clean you up a little bit first, okay? he says, pulling the bathrobe from Andrew's grasp.

Edgar happens to have a bottle of water in his bag, and he uses that to dampen one of the sleeves near the cuff. With that, he carefully cleans away, as best he can, the blood and dirt that appeared on Andrew with the merge.

There isn't much Edgar can do about the state of Andrew's clothes, but he doffs his hoodie and offers that.

It'll be big on you, he tells Andrew, but it will at least hide some of the damage.

It takes Daine a few moments to work out what Edgar's up to, and then she wags her tail approvingly. She does feel a twinge of guilt as that nice, white terrycloth is soiled, but it can be cleaned later. It's not as if she's going to be putting the bathrobe on anytime in the near future, so it might as well be used to make Andrew look a little bit less like he's been dragged down the sidewalk by a runaway pony. When Edgar offers his hoodie, she reaches out with a paw and touches his arm so she can send him a little burst of gratitude.

"Oi!" Andrew doesn't want to sit back down, and feels a flash of annoyance as he's detained for he knows not what purpose. Getting upright is a significantly greater challenge than expected, though, and he can't seem to manage to do both that and wriggle free of Edgar's grasp. In the end he does neither, and finds himself right back where he started with Edgar saying something about cleaning and taking away the bathrobe Andrew had forgotten he was carrying. He gives the human a disapproving frown and flinches away at the first touch, but the facts finally catch up with him about the time he sees the robe come away tinged red with his blood. "Oh, blood," he acknowledges, reaching up to touch the wound, which has thankfully closed up. "I forgot about the blood. Won't you get cold?"

Edgar shakes his head with a smile. They can't be too far from the park, so he won't have to go without the hoodie for long. Besides which, it's a fairly warm day. He offers a hand to help Andrew get back on his feet.

Daine positions herself on Andrew's other side as Edgar helps him up. Fortunately, she's a big dog - and Andrew hasn't grown so much that he can't still brace himself against her shoulder if he needs to.

Andrew shrugs on the hoodie, too woozy to argue, and puts one hand on Daine's shoulders as he accepts Edgar's help with the other. He's taller than either of him expects to be, and for a few disconcerting moments it seems to him like the entire world is gigantic and tiny, overwhelmingly close and incredibly far away. Then he carefully steps down onto the next stair, and the world resolves into one experience. It's still like watching from deep inside his head, but his muscles obey when he -- when they -- try to move.

"See? We can walk just fine," he says breathlessly. At least his sense of balance has returned, or remained.

Edgar chooses not to comment on the "we" usage. For what it's worth, Andrew does appear to be steady on his feet, so they can at least be on the move again.

Staying at Andrew's side, Edgar follows him out onto the sidewalk, once again heading in the direction of the park.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject