bigapplesauce | a thankless job but somebody's got to do it [closed]

Current Location: Wilmot's End
Current Music: July 18th (still a little backdated yup)

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a thankless job but somebody's got to do it [closed]

Seth's not entirely sure how much he likes being called up as a newbie's guide to superpowers. Any recognition is still a bit too much for him, and he doesn't like meeting at a pre-determined time with someone he doesn't know. But Wilmot's End is just about the only place he feels is safe, neutral ground.

He'd actually showed up pretty early, thinking he might scout for other newbies with fresh powers they might like to get rid of, but he's felt far too anti-social to actually approach anyone. His anxiety's been kicking in, much earlier than he'd like. It's a worrying trend that he's trying very hard not to think about too much.

So he's sitting a little towards the back, nursing a drink and watching the door from his booth. Looking for anyone who looks a little lost and out of place, like they're searching for someone.

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"Mm. Getting rid of it is a possibility," he answers with a nod. Were it a bit more interesting power, and Seth weren't feeling so averse to taking powers in general these days, he'd currently be talking Daniel into giving it up, emphasising not just the inconveniences but the possible risks involved.

"Usually, learning to control it is just a matter of trying to do it intentionally. Bit like using a new muscle, like learning how to wiggle your ears. What's probably happening now is you're just using the power subconsciously or as a reflex."

"Reflex. What, you mean like, emotionally?" He rubs at his chin, brow furrowed. "Hmm. Okay, that makes sense. I thought it just sorta happened but no, that, that explains a bit."

He nods to himself for a second before remembering, right, middle of a conversation here.

"Do you have any idea how I'd go about doing that? I don't know, pointers? This whole thing's kinda new for me. I'm not used to, uh, to powers and things. Well. Sort of. Relatively speaking." Okay, that'd be stretching the truth a bit. More than a bit. Daniel's not sure how open he should be about the whole Ascended thing because as far as ice breakers go, it's not ideal.

You know what, Seth's just not going to ask about clarification about that one right at this moment. It might be a sort of accurate description of himself before the Rift, actually. Definitely used to the existence of powers, but not having a whole host of them himself.

"Mostly seems to work by intent, for most people," he answers with a shrug. "When you do it by accident, try to figure out if it felt like anything, then try to recreate it. Eventually you reach a point where you just.. do it." To illustrate, Seth stops playing with his glass and flattens out his palm, then passes it right through his glass, as if neither were solid.

"Oh. Oh wow. That's fascinating." Daniel leans in close, studying the phenomenon with interest. "You can shift phase? You can localize it? And you're able to keep in sight with our phase? That's incredible. What about objects? How exactly -"

Again, he has to force himself to stop peppering the man with questions. But - fascinating. Really! He can name one or two people off the top of his head who'd love to study this kind of thing in-depth, himself included.

But. Priorities.

"Handier than paperclips and post-its, let me tell you." Daniel chances a smile at that, brief and hopefully less intimidating than a wall of questions.

Seth can't help but grin a bit at the guy's nerdy enthusiasm. Certainly a much more on-point reaction than most people's though. Asking actually intelligent questions. Not that Seth can really explain or elaborate the science between it or anything like that. He just knows what works and what doesn't. But Daniel seems to reconsider drowning him in questions anyway.

"Never know, though, you might be able to make other things too," he points out. "And I dunno, I've seen worse powers than never-ending store of office supplies."

Daniel sits back, pleased he's able to get along with someone without offending them, which seems to be a disturbing recurrence these days.

"You know, I haven't been keeping track," he admits sheepishly. "I was more concerned with an unwarranted buildup of office supplies than categorizing. And, uh." That last statement was a bit eyebrow-raising, and raise eyebrows it does. "What do you mean by worse powers? You mean more inconvenient, or...?"

Seth makes a face. "Well. If you can call 'severely hazardous to your own health' merely inconvenient..." The statement might come off a bit more grim and personal than he intended it to sound. But he's not about to discuss that, so let's change the subject.

"Anyway, I take it you'd like to figure out how to use it, rather than just have it gone?" he asks.

"Wait - have it gone? You mean I can do that?" That's an interesting thought. And a tempting one. But then again, it would really be just Daniel's luck if the fate of the world happens to come down on the right-sized paperclip except, whoops, he can't make those anymore.

As for "severely hazardous" powers, well. Daniel could make a few cautious guesses, but he's not sure he wants to know the particulars. Which is good, seeing as Seth's expressed no desire to talk about them either.

Seth nods in reply, taking another drink and emptying his glass.

"Though for the record, you haven't noticed any... side-effects to it? Any particular problems you didn't have before that you can't ascribe to anything in particular?" he asks. Because he is sure not taking a piddly little power like that if it has negative consequences.

"Nothing I can think of, no." Daniel frowns, trying to remember feeling anything aside from annoyance that yet another heap of pens managed to invade his precious sock supply. "But, like I said, it's all pretty new to me. It might be I just haven't noticed anything yet."

He hesitates, wondering if he should mention pre-existing circumstances. He's never been sure if he should exactly lump them in the realm of "powers" but they're certainly oddities. Oddities he's gotten used to, granted, but it's still a sticky situation. And that means he'd have to bring up some more personal information which he might not be wholly comfortable disclosing.

But then again, Seth's given him no reason to distrust him. So onward he goes.

"Well, there're...extenuating circumstances. Stuff that happened before all, uh, this. I don't think that's affected anything paperclip-related, though, so. Yeah."

Seth frowns. "You mean you had some abilities before you came through the rift too?" he asks, sounding a mix of curious and worried. That's definitely something he needs to know about if he's going to be taking one power. He could accidentally take them all, or take the wrong one.

"In a manner of speaking." Daniel winces a little because, yeah, this conversation is always a brand of awkward bordering on painful. "Little while ago, I kind of...spent some time on a higher plane. Well I - actually I had to die first, and then I Ascended which is - I, uh, I don't actually know if you have that here." He looks upward with absurd curiosity, as if the ceiling might somehow extemporaneously confirm the existence of a higher plane in this universe.

"But, uh, see, after that I came back a little, um. Different. Er, well, the first time not as much. I didn't actually learn how to retain anything until I Ascended the second time, and at that point..." He trails off, very aware that he probably sounds completely out of his mind. He grimaces again, this time apologetically. "It's a bit of a long story."

Seth eyebrows just steadily climb as Daniel explains. By the time he mentions Ascending, whatever that means, a second time, Seth sits back, torn between amusement, confusion, and concern.

"I can tell," he answers, watching Daniel closely. "So you ended up with some stuff that humans generally don't have?" he asks. Then he adds, "Assuming, of course, you are human." Always good to make sure. Considering he's met aliens and archangels and demigods and whatnot, all of whom looked human enough, he wouldn't be too surprised.

Daniel exhales with a slow whoosh of breath before nodding wearily. Seth is taking this well. That's good.

"More or less. I mean, I'm not sure what else you'd call me at this point. 'Human with a side of Ancient,' maybe. The beings that showed me how to Ascend," he explains hastily. "Those're Ancients. Basically now it means I just have...leftover knowledge of the higher plane, latent senses, stuff in my subconscious that sometimes I can access. Meditation helps. Usually. I could do a lot more when I actually was Ascended but, well." He half-shrugs and rubs at the surface of the table with a finger. "There were disagreements, and I couldn't stay."

"Right," he answers slowly. Seth has seen a lot of weird shit, so it takes a lot to really shock him. But he's not going to delve into this whole thing. He's pretty sure he lacks a pretty hefty amount of context here. And it makes it kind of hard to determine what exactly those things are and if they're just memories or instincts rather than powers. He's also surprised by how extremely little pomp or bragging Daniel is explaining all this, but that might just be Seth being used to Gabe, who frequently just casually throws out hints of these sort of things seemingly just to impress and befuddle.

"So... Is that stuff you'd rather were gone too, or...?" he asks. Daniel doesn't seem to have much enthusiasm for it, but that doesn't mean he's looking to get rid of it.

"Not really, no." He can still remember the last time he was Wilmot's End and that...thing that had been sitting with them and he adds a silent definitely no. "It's useful, mostly. You know. Universe, meaning-of-life stuff." The smile that follows is more than a little self-deprecating. "And it's all probably still mnemonically tied to my subconscious so getting rid of that would, well. There'd be memory loss, possible brain damage, I'd be confused, it'd suck."

Seth nods in understanding. "Brain damage is generally best avoided," he concurs. Oh, if only his powers gave him meaning-of-life stuff. That would've come in handy a few times.

"Not exactly sure where the line between superpower and inherently a part of your being is drawn. But that kind of sounds like it's across that line."

"It's...difficult to explain. But yeah, I think we can assume the post-Ascended stuff is a little less purely neurological than it is intrinsic. Possibly biological. Not entirely clear on that bit, actually." Daniel's long since given up on trying to understand it. It's likely he did at some point, but it must have back been when he existed as energy on a different plane.

"The office supplies thing is unrelated, though. Er, at least I'm pretty sure it is. I like to think I'd have noticed if it wasn't."

Seth smiles a little. "Well, in that case it shouldn't be difficult to get rid of." Though honestly, if you're not freaked out by the idea of a power itself, he doesn't really see why he would actually give it away. Unless it really is that inconvenient.

Daniel nods, sucking on his lower lip thoughtfully. "Hm. Okay. Well, I mean, I can hang onto it to make sure there aren't any nasty side effects or anything. Wouldn't be surprised if there were," he adds glumly. "That always seems to be the case."

Then a new thought occurs to him. "How would one go about getting rid of it, anyway?"

For a moment, Seth seems lost in thought, looking at Daniel's lip as he sucks on it, then looks up quickly when he's asked a question.

"Um, I can give and take powers from people," Seth answers after a moment, figuring Daniel has given him more than enough information about himself for Seth to share this. It's sort of a thing he has to share before taking someone's powers anyway.

"Really." Daniel sits up a little straighter, eyes widening. "God, that's amazing. Have you always been able to?" He has to bite back about a dozen more questions, realizing the man doesn't seem entirely comfortable with admitting it.

"I mean," he amends, quickly trying to draw the conversation away from the subject. "No wonder Lucy figured you could help."

Shit, that wasn't really successful.

Well, Seth appreciates the attempt, though it's really only apparent at the sudden awkwardness.

"I got it a couple years ago, back in my home universe," he answers. "There was a.. storm that gave people superpowers." He shrugs. Not really weirder than Ancients or whatever, just a different kind of weird.

"Huh." Daniel blinks. A storm. Okay, a bit on the unconventional side, but not unheard of. And what isn't unconventional these days? Apparently not power-dispensing storms or spaciotemporal relocation, that's for sure. "I can't imagine that'd be very easy for you. You probably get everyone asking you to give them this power or take away that one."

And here Daniel is, up until about a minute ago prepared to ask the same thing.

He shuts his eyes, takes off his glasses, and rubs at the bridge of his nose, immediately contrite.

"God, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to - if it's easier on you, I can hang on to this one. Really, it's, it's a minor inconvenience at the worst."

Seth stares in surprise at Daniel. He's used to this bit of information being met with fear and distrust, and if not that, considering Seth merely a way to rid themselves of bothersome powers or perhaps gaining new ones. And here's Daniel apologising for making Seth uncomfortable when he didn't even know.

Hell, even Gabriel, who is now probably Seth's most trusted friend in the city, had responded to the information by threatening to snap Seth's neck if he took one of his.

"Actually I made a bit of a business out of it," he answers after a moment, to calm Daniel's worries and reassure him that it's not actually that big of a deal.

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