Banjo couldn't sleep.
Whilst his body had well and truly healed he still felt ghost pains from that night. He'd turn and twist trying to find a way to sleep which would ease the pressure on his ravaged body which didn't have a scar to bear.
The size of the bed did nothing to help, either.
He was used to single beds and cots and swags, and in this pampered preppy school everyone got their own huge bed. A bed that was far too soft, and he could lie well across without covering the area.
He'd piled clothes on it just to try and take space. Make it feel less sparse, open and bare. Some nights it was more effective than others.
Life since he'd left the infirmary was just as uncomfortable. His Community contribution at the Collegiate library saw him inundated with a swarm, a horde, of girls who'd gossip and seemingly double in number with every passing day. Something weird was going on. Had been ever since the incident.
Calliope was acting... irregularly... around him. Inconsistent with how she'd been speaking with him before that night. She'd said she had wanted to take time to get to know him, she seemed to try to avoid him at times, but then things would run hot and cold when they were actually together, noticeably hot in particular, and she wasn't backwards in making physical contact. But she'd said earlier she didn't want things to just be physical, or her using him for that or whatever.
His life seemed almost... split... between his time before and after the infirmary.
He needed someone to talk to about all of this, but he didn't really have anyone. Old mate Butler would probably just give him shit and be less than no help. Elle kind of dodged him a little since she did the good legwork of getting Calli back in touch after they'd tried to deny him visitors. Just the thought of a repeat performance from the Hyperhuman terrorist Hyperion had been more than enough to put the wind up her a bit. That day seemed to impact everyone else pretty heavily. Probably because they were still left in the thick of it whilst he was quickly ragdoll'd in seconds. Barely had the time to regret his words... as if that were a thing he would ever do in the first place. Ground was under him. Then it was WAAAAY under him. Then it was very quickly rushing towards him.
But with Elle creating distance he just realised he didn't really have anyone to talk to about it. Most people he knew, he just didn't really have that kind of relationship with to talk about this kind of stuff. His own inexperience and Calli's seemingly strange, inconsistent behaviour. Not that he was complaining about the hot and cold treatment, it just would have been nice to have some kind of understanding about what the Hell was going on. Not like he could talk to anybody else.
Least of all his roommates. Any discussion on this would, well, kind of just be seen as rubbing their faces in it.
But still, it left him confused and isolated... whilst ironically never being more popular. It probably wouldn't last, sure. He'd do something knuckleheaded eventually and things would return to the usual status quo eventually. Inevitably. But it didn't make things any less frustrating now.
He kicked the quilt off the bed with a deep sigh.
Drink. Get something to drink. Reset. Maybe then sleep will find you.
He staggered from the bed in his boxers, to the communal kitchen and the coffee machine.
He had one eye half squinted open from beneath the unnegotiable bramble which was his hair, as he scratched his chest and considered his options.
No coffee. That'd be dumb. Warm milk's too bland... He checked the chocolate powder in the shaker, and didn't give anyone else a second thought.
"That'll do..."
Not coffee. Not at this hour.
He upturned the shaker over a mug and holding it in place, he gave it a good shake until he felt he had enough powder.
Something rustled.
He straightened slightly, a perplexed expression penetrating the exhausted face. He froze. The chocolate powder was communal. For dusting. Not for what he was doing.
The noise had stopped though, whatever it was. Somewhere in the darkness. Not that Zimmerman would ever let him have it if he found what he was doing with the chocolate powder in the first place. Big Steve wouldn't want to wake everyone over it either. He'd just hear sullen bullshit and passive aggression in the morning, that was more his M.O. The instinct of getting caught just got to him in the moment. He yawned broadly and scratched his chest again, slowly feeling more secure.
He did hear something though.
Fuck it. Whatever it was wouldn't be important.
He hit the 'Hot Milk' button on the machine, with his mug in place to cover the pilfered powder. It started it's obnoxious cacophony as it performed its task.
Then he felt it.
A-- cat--? Its tail slowly entwining itself around his calf and lower leg. He straightened again in confusion.
'When did they get a cat?'
But that didn't make sense for more reasons than one.
For one thing cats are normally furry or fluffy.
He felt someone's gaze upon him in the darkness.
This is more-- scaly.
A feminine smirk from someone he'd never seen before, barely outlined from the dim light of the coffee machine. He caught a brief glimpse of a forked tongue flicking at the air. The corners of her mouth creased even wider.
"Oh shi--..."
Before his sleep deprived mind could finish the thought, he was off his feet. The strong tail dragging him to the one room in the dorm he'd never set foot in.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
"No." She said flatly.
"Well, that's somethin' I guess." He half-jogged at an awkward pace to keep up with her. "I mean, I'm not surprised they lumped you in the beige brigade as well, but I was worried they might make your life even--"
"No. I mean 'No. Stop talking to me.'" Shoshanna's scaly arms crossed her chest as she pushed on.
"You think they're watching us..?" Banjo quickly turned and looked around, trying to spot the surveillance.
"No, you idiot. I mean stop talking to me. I finally have a chance to start over and make a new first impression after you and that bitch played a prank on me and ruined my reputation at our last school."
"Prank? You think I pranked you - a person I had never met and never think, nor thought about - to try and commit sexual assault on me? Some prank." Lawyer Banjo flashed his head.
"Ssssssh!" She tried to silence him, unable to cover her natural lisp as she hushed him. She hoped the words wouldn't travel across the open ocean to find her here. "Sure. Is that why you bragged about it?"
"Bragged abou--?! I never told a damn soul."
"Then how'd it follow me around school for five years?"
"I. Don't. Know. Not from me. I'd just been tossed away like a used Kleenex in front of everybody into a hospital bed like it was nothing, you think I wanted people to know you were able to drag me into your bedroom and I wasn't able to do a damn thing about it?"
"Her then. Before she got expelled. She must have told everybody."
"Elle didn't get expelled. She stuck out the full four years. Course she stopped talking to me. Probably over this. Who could blame her? Believe me, she would have been just as embarrassed about the whole thing as we both were."
"That still doesn't explain why you keep trying to talk to me now."
"I told you... you've got to watch yourself here. They have... a different way of seeing hyperhumans like yourself. They see you as-- less than. 'Sub-species' is the term they use for it. Haven - girl on my team - has been on the receiving end of it. It went so far as one psychopath trying to--" He stopped. The thought was still too raw, after what happened to Calliope.
"They have some... different views about certain types of hyperhumans. Different types of views about a lot of things, by the looks..." He generalised.
"So? I'm supposed to think you care? You never cared enough to speak to me before."
"You shut yourself in your room or went out. And I didn't exactly blame you for doin' that. After everything, I kind of feel its best to respect your bloody privacy. And there's a difference between caring enough to be a friend to a person, and caring about their basic fundamental well-being and that they not be ravaged and have their shit harvested by some lunatic fringe nutbag. You'll notice I'm not asking about your day, am I?"
"That's exactly what you were asking me." She smirked back, skepticism still deeply imprinted on her face.
"From an angle of a person who doesn't want to see you get your shit harvested! 'Hey, have you come across anybody saying anything like 'Cor, check out the scales on that sub-species.'" He snapped back with no small amount of exasperation.
"Look... all I'm saying, is that if you notice anyone being particularly, I dunno, cruel over your-- whole-- deal. Or acting weird."
"Weird?" She levelled him with a look that suggested she was looking at such a person as they spoke.
"Ha. Ha. By our standards, 'weird'. Even if it's just you feel someone looking at you funny. I want to know about it."
Shoshanna snorted dismissively. Her tongue whipping out in a flash, before returning home, so quickly a bystander could scarcely tell it had happened in the first place, as she shook her head.
"What?"
"You just live such a charmed life, don't you? Do you have any idea how many people and how often I get 'looked at funny'? Even back in our old school?"
He went to reply, but it was clear she wasn't done with what she had to say yet.
"Even just studying I could feel eyes on me. Always. And after what happened with..." She sighed, and focused inwards, as if fighting off an outburst that could be a public spectacle. "After THAT it was all the time from everyone. And whispers. Always whispers. Could you imagine what it's like when you've waited so long to get into a place where you might finally be accepted for what you are. WHO you are. And then have that first impression trampled on, just to become a-- a FREAK in everyone's eyes again. Some monstrous thing that can't control herself? You both STOLE that from me."
"I. Did. Nothing. To you. I was as much a victim of what happened as I came to realise you were. Many would unfairly claim 'moreso'." He crisply fired back.
"You are just the worst--"
"--person you ever attempted to mate with against their will? Cheers. It's an Honour." He shot back, leer on his face.
Her quickened gasp, made it clear his instinctive response was a tactical error.
As she turned and ran down the hallway, he cursed at himself. "Stupid."
He'd just put more space in between himself and probably the most vulnerable target in this place. There was no way she'd trust him enough, if anything worth reporting did happen to come up and threaten her now.
No leads, few allies and his horse stirring up a tempest in his gut.
If he was honest with himself it was stirring more out of fresh guilt than ill-preparation or the origin of the meal.
He'd since formed the conclusion that on that night there were two victims. The nature of Shoshanna's hyperhuman powers and physiology went beyond skin deep. The 'reptilian brain' was more developed in her, the reptilian brain which was more susceptible to the natural urges that came from pheromone dispersal than the average person.
He found himself under direct physical threat - of sorts... - that night, but she had fallen victim to a situation beyond her own control as well.
He just hated that somehow she was attempting to blame him for it. There were enough things in this world that people COULD fairly blame him for, without concocting new ridiculous things that he wasn't responsible for. It triggered the persecution complex that drove his lawyer brain into overdrive.
Time was, Zimmerman would be able to get to work putting out his fires on this one. Quiet hushed conversation through her closed over door. But that was more complicated here and now. He was going to have to let time scab that wound and hope nothing befell her in the meantime.
She did raise a reasonable question about how it spread across the school so fast. He always just chalked it up to being such a small island, nothing stays hushed long. Some rumour snuck out of faculty somewhere into some student's ear and then it spread like wildfire. Perhaps the 'real reason' of Elodie Miller's departure. He'd never really given it much thought, because that rumour was a long forgotten one in the cacophony of gossip and scuttlebutt that surrounded him and his actions. He'd had five years of questionable behaviour which swirled those waters since then. Shoshanna had-- well, she'd always tried to keep quiet and to herself. So that one never left. And was the only thing many knew about her. It became a label, that forever stuck to her. However unfair as it may have been.
Regardless of how her actions did nothing to help people forget or move on from it, it still wasn't fair that she be viewed as little more beyond that. Her vulnerability to the pheromones he'd been unknowingly doused with making a victim of her as well.
The best indicator he had for spotting sentiments similar to those shared by Daedalus in this place was running from him and viewed him with a level of disdain that wouldn't soon be repaired.
Whilst his body had well and truly healed he still felt ghost pains from that night. He'd turn and twist trying to find a way to sleep which would ease the pressure on his ravaged body which didn't have a scar to bear.
The size of the bed did nothing to help, either.
He was used to single beds and cots and swags, and in this pampered preppy school everyone got their own huge bed. A bed that was far too soft, and he could lie well across without covering the area.
He'd piled clothes on it just to try and take space. Make it feel less sparse, open and bare. Some nights it was more effective than others.
Life since he'd left the infirmary was just as uncomfortable. His Community contribution at the Collegiate library saw him inundated with a swarm, a horde, of girls who'd gossip and seemingly double in number with every passing day. Something weird was going on. Had been ever since the incident.
Calliope was acting... irregularly... around him. Inconsistent with how she'd been speaking with him before that night. She'd said she had wanted to take time to get to know him, she seemed to try to avoid him at times, but then things would run hot and cold when they were actually together, noticeably hot in particular, and she wasn't backwards in making physical contact. But she'd said earlier she didn't want things to just be physical, or her using him for that or whatever.
His life seemed almost... split... between his time before and after the infirmary.
He needed someone to talk to about all of this, but he didn't really have anyone. Old mate Butler would probably just give him shit and be less than no help. Elle kind of dodged him a little since she did the good legwork of getting Calli back in touch after they'd tried to deny him visitors. Just the thought of a repeat performance from the Hyperhuman terrorist Hyperion had been more than enough to put the wind up her a bit. That day seemed to impact everyone else pretty heavily. Probably because they were still left in the thick of it whilst he was quickly ragdoll'd in seconds. Barely had the time to regret his words... as if that were a thing he would ever do in the first place. Ground was under him. Then it was WAAAAY under him. Then it was very quickly rushing towards him.
But with Elle creating distance he just realised he didn't really have anyone to talk to about it. Most people he knew, he just didn't really have that kind of relationship with to talk about this kind of stuff. His own inexperience and Calli's seemingly strange, inconsistent behaviour. Not that he was complaining about the hot and cold treatment, it just would have been nice to have some kind of understanding about what the Hell was going on. Not like he could talk to anybody else.
Least of all his roommates. Any discussion on this would, well, kind of just be seen as rubbing their faces in it.
But still, it left him confused and isolated... whilst ironically never being more popular. It probably wouldn't last, sure. He'd do something knuckleheaded eventually and things would return to the usual status quo eventually. Inevitably. But it didn't make things any less frustrating now.
He kicked the quilt off the bed with a deep sigh.
Drink. Get something to drink. Reset. Maybe then sleep will find you.
He staggered from the bed in his boxers, to the communal kitchen and the coffee machine.
He had one eye half squinted open from beneath the unnegotiable bramble which was his hair, as he scratched his chest and considered his options.
No coffee. That'd be dumb. Warm milk's too bland... He checked the chocolate powder in the shaker, and didn't give anyone else a second thought.
"That'll do..."
Not coffee. Not at this hour.
He upturned the shaker over a mug and holding it in place, he gave it a good shake until he felt he had enough powder.
Something rustled.
He straightened slightly, a perplexed expression penetrating the exhausted face. He froze. The chocolate powder was communal. For dusting. Not for what he was doing.
The noise had stopped though, whatever it was. Somewhere in the darkness. Not that Zimmerman would ever let him have it if he found what he was doing with the chocolate powder in the first place. Big Steve wouldn't want to wake everyone over it either. He'd just hear sullen bullshit and passive aggression in the morning, that was more his M.O. The instinct of getting caught just got to him in the moment. He yawned broadly and scratched his chest again, slowly feeling more secure.
He did hear something though.
Fuck it. Whatever it was wouldn't be important.
He hit the 'Hot Milk' button on the machine, with his mug in place to cover the pilfered powder. It started it's obnoxious cacophony as it performed its task.
Then he felt it.
A-- cat--? Its tail slowly entwining itself around his calf and lower leg. He straightened again in confusion.
'When did they get a cat?'
But that didn't make sense for more reasons than one.
For one thing cats are normally furry or fluffy.
He felt someone's gaze upon him in the darkness.
This is more-- scaly.
A feminine smirk from someone he'd never seen before, barely outlined from the dim light of the coffee machine. He caught a brief glimpse of a forked tongue flicking at the air. The corners of her mouth creased even wider.
"Oh shi--..."
Before his sleep deprived mind could finish the thought, he was off his feet. The strong tail dragging him to the one room in the dorm he'd never set foot in.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Location: The Foundation - Present
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Human #5.075: Shoshanna Tannin
Interaction(s): Former P.R.C.U transfers to The Foundation
Previously: Horses
"No." She said flatly.
"Well, that's somethin' I guess." He half-jogged at an awkward pace to keep up with her. "I mean, I'm not surprised they lumped you in the beige brigade as well, but I was worried they might make your life even--"
"No. I mean 'No. Stop talking to me.'" Shoshanna's scaly arms crossed her chest as she pushed on.
"You think they're watching us..?" Banjo quickly turned and looked around, trying to spot the surveillance.
"No, you idiot. I mean stop talking to me. I finally have a chance to start over and make a new first impression after you and that bitch played a prank on me and ruined my reputation at our last school."
"Prank? You think I pranked you - a person I had never met and never think, nor thought about - to try and commit sexual assault on me? Some prank." Lawyer Banjo flashed his head.
"Ssssssh!" She tried to silence him, unable to cover her natural lisp as she hushed him. She hoped the words wouldn't travel across the open ocean to find her here. "Sure. Is that why you bragged about it?"
"Bragged abou--?! I never told a damn soul."
"Then how'd it follow me around school for five years?"
"I. Don't. Know. Not from me. I'd just been tossed away like a used Kleenex in front of everybody into a hospital bed like it was nothing, you think I wanted people to know you were able to drag me into your bedroom and I wasn't able to do a damn thing about it?"
"Her then. Before she got expelled. She must have told everybody."
"Elle didn't get expelled. She stuck out the full four years. Course she stopped talking to me. Probably over this. Who could blame her? Believe me, she would have been just as embarrassed about the whole thing as we both were."
"That still doesn't explain why you keep trying to talk to me now."
"I told you... you've got to watch yourself here. They have... a different way of seeing hyperhumans like yourself. They see you as-- less than. 'Sub-species' is the term they use for it. Haven - girl on my team - has been on the receiving end of it. It went so far as one psychopath trying to--" He stopped. The thought was still too raw, after what happened to Calliope.
"They have some... different views about certain types of hyperhumans. Different types of views about a lot of things, by the looks..." He generalised.
"So? I'm supposed to think you care? You never cared enough to speak to me before."
"You shut yourself in your room or went out. And I didn't exactly blame you for doin' that. After everything, I kind of feel its best to respect your bloody privacy. And there's a difference between caring enough to be a friend to a person, and caring about their basic fundamental well-being and that they not be ravaged and have their shit harvested by some lunatic fringe nutbag. You'll notice I'm not asking about your day, am I?"
"That's exactly what you were asking me." She smirked back, skepticism still deeply imprinted on her face.
"From an angle of a person who doesn't want to see you get your shit harvested! 'Hey, have you come across anybody saying anything like 'Cor, check out the scales on that sub-species.'" He snapped back with no small amount of exasperation.
"Look... all I'm saying, is that if you notice anyone being particularly, I dunno, cruel over your-- whole-- deal. Or acting weird."
"Weird?" She levelled him with a look that suggested she was looking at such a person as they spoke.
"Ha. Ha. By our standards, 'weird'. Even if it's just you feel someone looking at you funny. I want to know about it."
Shoshanna snorted dismissively. Her tongue whipping out in a flash, before returning home, so quickly a bystander could scarcely tell it had happened in the first place, as she shook her head.
"What?"
"You just live such a charmed life, don't you? Do you have any idea how many people and how often I get 'looked at funny'? Even back in our old school?"
He went to reply, but it was clear she wasn't done with what she had to say yet.
"Even just studying I could feel eyes on me. Always. And after what happened with..." She sighed, and focused inwards, as if fighting off an outburst that could be a public spectacle. "After THAT it was all the time from everyone. And whispers. Always whispers. Could you imagine what it's like when you've waited so long to get into a place where you might finally be accepted for what you are. WHO you are. And then have that first impression trampled on, just to become a-- a FREAK in everyone's eyes again. Some monstrous thing that can't control herself? You both STOLE that from me."
"I. Did. Nothing. To you. I was as much a victim of what happened as I came to realise you were. Many would unfairly claim 'moreso'." He crisply fired back.
"You are just the worst--"
"--person you ever attempted to mate with against their will? Cheers. It's an Honour." He shot back, leer on his face.
Her quickened gasp, made it clear his instinctive response was a tactical error.
As she turned and ran down the hallway, he cursed at himself. "Stupid."
He'd just put more space in between himself and probably the most vulnerable target in this place. There was no way she'd trust him enough, if anything worth reporting did happen to come up and threaten her now.
No leads, few allies and his horse stirring up a tempest in his gut.
If he was honest with himself it was stirring more out of fresh guilt than ill-preparation or the origin of the meal.
He'd since formed the conclusion that on that night there were two victims. The nature of Shoshanna's hyperhuman powers and physiology went beyond skin deep. The 'reptilian brain' was more developed in her, the reptilian brain which was more susceptible to the natural urges that came from pheromone dispersal than the average person.
He found himself under direct physical threat - of sorts... - that night, but she had fallen victim to a situation beyond her own control as well.
He just hated that somehow she was attempting to blame him for it. There were enough things in this world that people COULD fairly blame him for, without concocting new ridiculous things that he wasn't responsible for. It triggered the persecution complex that drove his lawyer brain into overdrive.
Time was, Zimmerman would be able to get to work putting out his fires on this one. Quiet hushed conversation through her closed over door. But that was more complicated here and now. He was going to have to let time scab that wound and hope nothing befell her in the meantime.
She did raise a reasonable question about how it spread across the school so fast. He always just chalked it up to being such a small island, nothing stays hushed long. Some rumour snuck out of faculty somewhere into some student's ear and then it spread like wildfire. Perhaps the 'real reason' of Elodie Miller's departure. He'd never really given it much thought, because that rumour was a long forgotten one in the cacophony of gossip and scuttlebutt that surrounded him and his actions. He'd had five years of questionable behaviour which swirled those waters since then. Shoshanna had-- well, she'd always tried to keep quiet and to herself. So that one never left. And was the only thing many knew about her. It became a label, that forever stuck to her. However unfair as it may have been.
Regardless of how her actions did nothing to help people forget or move on from it, it still wasn't fair that she be viewed as little more beyond that. Her vulnerability to the pheromones he'd been unknowingly doused with making a victim of her as well.
The best indicator he had for spotting sentiments similar to those shared by Daedalus in this place was running from him and viewed him with a level of disdain that wouldn't soon be repaired.