Warren & Felix; backdated to February 11
Feb. 11th, 2013 02:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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om_mainWhen seeking out some privacy, Warren has a run-in with Felix. The two end up finding themselves tucked away and having a heart-to-heart.
With the snow getting as bad as it was, there really hadn't been all that much point in gliding around outside; Warren had found that he was freezing up much faster than he could flap his wings to shake the ice loose and that was a pretty good indication that the sky was off limits, for now. Needless to say, the feeling was more unbearable than he ever could have imagined. Since taking to the sky on a daily basis, he'd come to find that staying grounded for long periods of time made him restless and antsy, not to mention distracted as hell.
In an attempt to try and shake some of that off, Warren decided to stroll around the halls of the large building, wandering places he seldom went (or hadn't seen at all). Xavier had never stated that anywhere was off limits, minus the girls' wing of course, so it didn't make him feel too nosy. What he didn't expect to find was Felix near the end of one of the dimmer halls. Warren had very, very sharp eye sight thanks to his mutation, and even from the distance away he was able to notice how exhausted the younger boy looked. It made him frown.
"Felix?" he called curiously. "Everything all right down there?"
The slender, ghostly form creeping down the hall went quite still at the sound of his name. Always before, Felix had managed to escape the notice of everyone else in the school when he slipped off to his secreted places around the mansion. He couldn't turn invisible, or fade away to the astral plane, or hide in shadows like some of the other kids, but he had many years of practice in plainly, simply evading the notice of others. Being caught here by Warren (of all people, shit) quite disturbed Felix's equilibrium.
Since he couldn't simply disappear as he wanted to, Felix turned and inched away from the darker end of the hall, closer to the more lighted areas where Warren had paused. "It's fine," he answered, tucking his arms around himself. He was dressed as he had been for classes earlier in the day, but with a few layers of socks on his feet instead of shoes. "Did you get lost? It's colder down this way, I'm 'fraid."
"No. Was just restless and needed a walk, was all." Felix seemed a little more withdrawn than usual, Warren couldn't help but notice. Or maybe just quieter, it was hard to say, but maybe it was just because he'd gotten rather used to the slightly enthusiastic side of him that he often saw, when they discussed clothes and their other shared interests.
"Do you hang out down here often or something?" he asked gently.
Felix really didn't want to tell anybody about why he had been sneaking off. Damon already knew and that was more than enough. Only he was a terrible liar, and he knew it. "Sometimes," Felix answered, glancing away and down. "I guess I get... what you called it. Restless, too. It's quiet and people don't come down here much."
Before he said or did anything else, Warren asked: "did you want some company?"
When it came to Warren, Felix was pretty much defenseless. He couldn't think of any good reason to turn the older fellow down. Shyly, Felix shrugged one shoulder. "It's not very interesting back there," he admitted, sliding a few steps further away from the darkened hall. "I don't mind if you got nothin' better to do."
"I don't have anything better to do," Warren assured him with a small smile, and then took a few steps forward until he joined Felix. "Are we sitting or walking? I don't quite know my way around back here, so I'll take your word for which is best."
Felix hesitated, but this wasn't his only hiding spot. It wouldn't be the end of the world if one person knew about it... probably. "If you want, I can show you..." he offered, tilting his chin down the hall, curling a hand around the back of his neck. Had he been a girl, it would have been a very different kind of invitation.
"Sure, lead the way." There wasn't any apprehension or strangeness in Warren's tone, just friendly casualness. He didn't want to sound like he was snooping or overstepping his boundaries as a friend, even if he did sense that something was up. Hopefully it was a question that he would be able to work into the conversation naturally, and wouldn't scare Felix off.
"Every time I start walking around this place I swear I end up finding some place new to go. It reminds me of when I was a kid and home from boarding school; I was able to actually explore my father's house and I'd always try and find the dark little corners like this." He gestured around and then glanced down at Felix. "Silly little memories, I suppose."
The hall was rather shadowy, and Felix wasn't exactly a graceful ninja. He felt his way along the wall until he found the right doorway, just two steps past a soft creak in the floorboard. "Don't sound silly," he said quietly. "Sounds like it made you happy. Your house was really this big?"
A faint squeak of hinge preceded the opening of the door Felix had found, which led into a slightly less-shadowy room. Perhaps once, many years ago, these rooms had been for servants, but now they held cast-off furniture that had likely been removed once the downstairs rooms had been converted into classrooms. Sofas, chairs, occasional tables, all scattered around the room without thought to arrangement.
"A little bigger, actually. I've lived in boarding schools much more than my parents' home, though, so I'm just used to big homes in general. All of them mysterious, which was always neat."
Warren followed Felix inside and let the door close behind them. His first thought was that it smelled very dusty in there and it was a wonder that he hadn't been sent into a sneezing fit. Somehow he managed not to, and smiled instead. "This is neat, too. This some kind of storage room, or something?"
"Maybe." Felix didn't know what it was, exactly, but the furniture was a hodge-podge of eras and styles that didn't even remotely fit together. "There's places like this around the house, where nobody goes. They're quiet. I had to clean up some of the dust."
The reason why became evident when Felix made his careful way around to the edge of the room near a large, time-darkened window. There, he had constructed himself a cozy little nest of cushions and a blanket, with the furniture arranged nearby so it couldn't be seen by someone looking in from the hall. When Felix came to a halt before his private dream-fort, he paused, and kept his gaze angled away, like he was sharing a secret that he should somehow be ashamed of.
Warren's eyebrows furrowed inward when he saw the makeshift little resting area, not quite sure what to say. He wasn't appalled or confused, but a little bit curious. Maybe apprehensive, too, if only because he didn't want to offend Felix or upset him by asking the wrong thing. A sleeping spot away from your normal bed wasn't that out of line, not at all, but it could imply a number of different things.
So. Tread carefully.
"It's quieter here than in the dorms, hm?" At least that was a truth that just about anyone here could agree with.
It certainly was quiet. Even the wind outside the window seemed muffled. Felix peered out, squinting a bit, though it wasn't easy to see much of anything -- hence, it wasn't easy to see inside, either.
"Mmhm. And Philip don't... doesn't know about it. He doesn't like it if I sleep too much. He thinks it's like running away, and not in the 'run and live to fight another day' kind 'f way."
"Because of your powers?" Warren questioned, just for clarification. Admittedy, he didn't know all that much about Felix's abilities and didn't want to make any assumptions about them, but he did want to try and understand it.
Felix nodded, not speaking right away. He'd held so many secrets for such a long time, because it seemed so much safer that way. If he didn't reveal anything of himself, then he couldn't develop the emotional closeness needed to be able to do... he things that Felix could do. Those secrets protected not only him, but the people around him. Letting any of them go just felt so dangerous.
"Right," said Felix more quietly, moving a couple of steps and toying with the old drapes around the window. "If I'm dreaming, then... I'm somewhere else. My own place. I've been going there so long, sometimes I like it more than being awake. That's what Philip thinks is... not so great."
Warren pursed his lips together; without the more detailed context, it was easy to say that Philip could go and fuck himself and to encourage Felix to do whatever it was that he wanted to do. However, some forms of escapism, no matter how innocent they seemed, could still be destructive so Warren didn't jump to it right away.
"What do you think? Is it not so great?" he asked instead.
What did he think? Felix blinked up at Warren, a little bit blankly. He still wasn't used to being asked such things. His answer came out of his mouth soft and ragged, slipping back into his natural Ozark accent. "Don't have nowhere else to go."
"You don't have anywhere else to go to sleep soundly or you don't have anywhere to go to feel safe and secure? Or both?" Warren questioned further. His tone was not at all accusatory, and remained soft.
Felix rolled one shoulder, not quite a shrug, but not quite a meaningful gesture, either. "It's not having the place to sleep," he tried to explain. "I have a couple of places. It's the place I go when I'm dreamin'. It's like... my home. Even though I made it all up, even the people there, it's really mine. That's where I can be safe."
Warren nodded, chewing his lower lip thoughtfully as he slid down the wall to sit on the floor, wings bellowing out on the carpet around him. It was comfy in here, admittedly, and he didn't mind staying for a while longer at all---not if Felix didn't.
"Well I suppose then that Phil only has reason to be concerned if you're going in and not coming back out, you know? But I think sometimes it's okay to want to escape the real world for awhile, especially when it gets ugly," Warren mused and glanced up at the younger boy. "You have to take care of yourself, not just physically but up in your head too. Everyone has something that they do for that...everyone. You're no different and that's okay."
Felix looked startled when he turned back to Warren, like nobody had ever told him he was okay in his lifetime. He definitely had never expected anyone to forgive his escapism into his dreamworld so quickly and easily. That was his secret, and Felix had learned in a most direct and painful way that secrets were something to be ashamed of.
He slid down into a crouch, draping his arms around his knees with his back against the cool window. "You don't... you don't think it's running away?"
"Maybe a little. Like I said, though, it really depends on how you go about doing it, you know? And I still think that people need to do things to cope in their own little ways," Warren mused, sounding certain of himself. "You still need to come back to the real world and you need to acknowledge that what's important is out here. You can't run and hide from here forever, but it's okay to take a break every now and then. Do you do what I mean by that?"
There were worse ways to escape--ways that could be very self destructive or even harmful to other people. Yes, it was possible for Felix to harm his mental state by hiding out for long periods of time and letting this fake world of his completely overpower the real word. As far as Warren knew, though, he wasn't doing that completely. It just didn't seem right to say that going to his dream world at all in any way was a terrible thing. Warren tried to equate it, in a weird way, to his own need to be off of the ground, in the sky, and away from civilisation throughout the day. His powers made it so that he needed to go out and fly and be free from other responsibilities in his life, and maybe Felix's powers had a similar thing? Maybe more intense and definitely more powerful, no question there, but they were all unique in the sense that they had to do things for themselves to remain sustained. Or so it seemed, anyway.
Obviously, Felix had to live in the waking world. He was living in it right at that moment. Only his dream life was so tempting, so warm and secure in a way that his real life never had been, that the times when Felix didn't want to escape to that other world were few and far between.
"I guess," he answered, quietly, after a few seconds' thought. "I wanted... when that girl with the wings got shot, I wanted to go there forever. I really did. If people hate her just for flying, they're gonna really hate it when they find out there's some of us that can get in their minds and mess around. Unless I can hide somehow, I'm... it don't look good for me, you know?"
"I know." Warren agreed with that sentiment exactly. For him it was kind of cut and dry, really; Elaine Dupree was a girl with wings who could fly...just like Warren. Because of that, he had a pretty good idea as to how the world would react to him, as harmless as he was. Comparatively. Knowing the people in this school and how many of them looked more frightening and were legitimately more frightening in terms of what their powers could do? It was pretty fucking bleak.
"But you didn't go in there forever, and that's the difference. If you can keep yourself grounded and in control enough to bring yourself back out again and not become some dream world hermit guy, then there's no harm in visiting there, Felix." Warren offered a very faint smile. "And if you ask me, this whole shooting thing...it's hard to deal with. It's a big deal and I'd be pretty concerned if it wasn't bothering people."
Then again, it wasn't good if it was really tearing people apart, either. "How are you dealing with it now?"
Silently, Felix studied his feet and shrugged, the gesture of a child who has done something wrong but can't express why. Damon had taken away the only other thing Felix really had to cope with fear and anxiety. Even though Felix knew it was better for him that he didn't want the drugs any more, it had left a kind of blank space that he wasn't sure how to fill.
"I guess I try not to think about it. I've been tryin'... Philip said I should try to think about what I could do that would make me really happy. Haven't come up with much, yet. But..." Felix's chin lifted the tiniest bit. "Eames was saying how anybody could learn how to hide. Maybe not as good as him, but like that. Become, you know, somebody else." Somebody better. Anybody would be better.
"You'd really want to be someone else?" Warren asked gently, leaning his head back against the wall.
"Shit, yes," Felix breathed, his eyes widening. "Nobody knows who I am. Nobody cares who I end up being. If I could just... cut away everything before I came here? That's what'd make me for-real happy."
"But the past makes you who you are; everything you've learned, everything that's hardened you and strengthened you comes from experience." Warren bit his lip and then lulled his head to the side to eye Felix curiously. Carefully. "I don't know everything you've been through, I know. I'm sorry if there's something in there that's traumatic and painful...learning experience or not, no one deserves that.
"Okay I realise not everything about the past is a good thing. Maybe another way to look at it is...if you could survive everything so far in your life up until this point, all of this mutant stuff is just another hurdle, you know? Something else you'll survive."
"I didn't do anything special," Felix argued, but without any heat behind it. Philip had said something similar, and the idea had rattled Felix so much that he hadn't really been able to think about it. "I ai... I'm not hard and I'm not strong. I..."
He caught himself before he could spill out any more awkward truths. Already, Felix had given away too much. Already, Warren knew more than Felix wanted him to know. No matter how much Felix might want such an open, understanding and beautiful friend, he knew that he couldn't have it. His abilities were far too dangerous to risk exposing Warren to what he could do. He just couldn't reveal any more of his true thoughts and feelings, couldn't allow anything like an emotional bond to develop between them.
Closing his eyes briefly, Felix breathed a quiet sigh. "I don't know. It probably makes no sense to you. You're everything that anybody would want to be. I probably sound crazy to you."
Warren winced and moved his head back to the wall so that he was staring out straight again. Inwardly he was chiding himself for pressing too much, making assumptions, and everything else. It was not his place and there was such thing as overstepping one's boundaries. Felix's comment about him being everything everyone else wanted to be, though? That bothered Warren a lot. He hated when people said shit like that to him (because this was far from the first time), but he knew better than to throw a little fit about it.
He was privileged. He knew it and so did everyone else.
"You don't...you don't sound crazy," Warren murmured quietly. "I'm sorry, okay? I shouldn't have assumed anything."
Shit. Sometimes, Felix almost wished Warren wasn't so nice to him, so patient and accepting of him. With Victor or Jean-Paul, Felix didn't have much problem keeping them at arms' length, knowing that it was for the best. It was different with Warren. Felix wanted desperately for the other boy to like him, even while being painfully aware of how dangerous that could be. That longing feeling , blended with Warren's natural kindness, left Felix in a state of helpless adoration.
"You don't need to be sorry. You're not... so far off about me," he admitted, his voice just as soft. "You're sweet, to say what you said. And to listen to me being weird."
Sometimes Warren swore that Felix reminded him more and more of Andrew by the day. Andrew used to hold back a lot and tried to avoid talking about the things that bothered him. He also had these dark secrets that he'd fought tooth and nail to avoid letting slip. On the outside, he had been this skinny, mostly defenseless kid that other people thought was weird and they liked to pick on him. Not Warren. Somehow the two of them had ended up being best friends, and now they couldn't even keep in touch.
That wasn't to say that Felix was some kind of stand in---because he wasn't. Felix was his own person and for as many similarities as he had to Andrew, there were differences too. It just felt so natural and not-so-odd for Warren to hang out and converse with Felix because of those similarities, that was all.
"Ah, I'll listen. Contrary to popular belief, I do like to make the attempt to be half decent at it," Warren replied in an attempt to assure Felix it was really not a big deal at all. "I'm still sorry, though, and I'm still going to insist that you're not so weird, so come off it."
Have a friendly smile for your troubles.
That smile just twisted Felix all up on the inside. He was definitely glad that Warren was straight. Felix wasn't ready to think about being attracted to people all on his own, not just yet.
He was also glad that his storage-room hideaway was somewhat dim, so maybe Warren wouldn't see the pink flush he knew was rising in his face. "Probably not a very popular belief," Felix tried not to mumble. Keeping careful control of his words and his accent was still important. "I've never heard anybody say anything but good things about you. And, you know... I'm pretty sure it's 'cause you're a nice person, and not 'cause of your name."
"Sometimes it takes quite a bit of effort to sway someone's opinion of you. I don't mind putting forth the effort for it, if I may be honest," Warren confessed, gaze still fixed on his younger friend. The blush colouring Felix's cheeks was, in fact, easy for him to see thanks to his mutated eye sight, but Warren had manners and would not call him out on it; that would be unnecessarily rude.
"But other people's opinions aren't everything, at the same time; popular opinion's overrated. I don't care what anyone else thinks of you, Felix. I'd like to consider you a friend."
If Warren had been like Tessa or Ellie, a telepath with strong mental barriers, if he didn't have those beautiful broad white wings, then Felix would have liked that, too. More than just about anything else he could imagine. For someone like him, an orphan from an impoverished stretch of lost countryside in the Midwest, to call Warren Worthington a friend... it sounded like a fairy tale. Like a dream that he might have constructed for himself.
"It's dangerous," Felix mumbled very softly. "Being friends with me. Not because of other people, but... just because of me."
"I could make the argument that it's dangerous being friends with many people...especially people here," Warren pointed out just as softly, and ducked his head a little to look Felix in the eye. "We don't have to be friends if you don't feel comfortable with it, but I'm at least going to put it out there that I'm not against a few risks."
As little as Felix wanted to tell Warren the truth, guilt was going to eat away at him if he led the other boy on in a lie. He looked downright miserable, staring down at the ground as he hugged one knee into his chest. "I won't hold you to it," Felix promised quietly. "If you change your mind. It's not just dreams I can control, it's people's minds. It's just harder when I'm awake, so... Professor Xavier says I got to have an 'emotional bond' first. Means it's just my friends whose minds I can take control of."
His voice dwindled away to little more than a whisper, and his body tensed, expecting an outburst of anger and betrayal.
It would have to take an abnormal level of idiocy to not be at least slightly put off by the idea of mind control; no matter how nice the person was, how careful they were, or what the circumstances happened to be, that power was terrifying. On the other hand, it wasn't like Felix got to choose what his power was and it wasn't really fair to think that he needed to be condemned to a life of isolation. Hell, no one did.
"Is Professor Xavier helping you control it?" Warren questioned.
Without looking up, Felix nodded slowly. "He's trying. I'm not very good. Everything's harder when I'm awake. Asleep, I can turn it off, no problem. Awake, it just... happens."
"It does happen overnight for everyone," Warren reasoned. "And it's...no reason to have to force yourself to be alone. I can't really imagine how freaky it must be for you, but come on. At least give yourself a chance."
Felix was quiet for a few moments. His powers weren't the only reason he kept other people at bay, just the strongest, and the most convenient. The secrets he kept also kept all of the power in his own hands. Felix had the power to decide if he could be close to another person or not. Felix got to choose. As soon as he told another person what he could do, then they could choose for themselves... and Felix was powerless again. Lowering his guard enough to be himself around someone else, someone who didn't have the mental shielding to keep him out like Tessa or Ellie did, seemed like a pipe dream.
As much of a dream as a dirt-poor hick orphan from the Ozarks becoming friends with someone like Warren.
"You don't think you'll end up wondering if you're making your own choices, or if I'm making them for you?" he asked quietly. "You wouldn't really know. Everybody shuts that Damon guy out. He's not much different than me. Just more honest about it."
That was a very fair argument. "Everyone shuts Damon out not just because he's honest but because he's malicious. He's a bully. Even powers aside, all you have to do is look on the network and see how he treats people and it's fairly obvious that he gets off on harming people."
That guy could have been a speedster or a telekinetic or even just a flyer and people still would not have liked or trusted him. However, Damon had a vicious, powerful ability that only helped him manipulate and abuse people further and that was why people were scared of him or didn't want to give even a minute amount of trust to him.
"All right let me give you another scenario. You could have two people with the power to create and manipulate fire, okay? The first one might be a pyromaniac and get a kick out of watching things burn, while the second might be scared of the damage their fire causes and they think about their power when they use it--not just how it might burn people, but how smoke might affect people, how the temperature works, or if they're a danger to the structure everyone is standing in. The first guy might have exquisite control and uses that control to cause very defined mayhem. The second guy might not have the best control and has an accident every now and then, but he still stays very aware of what he's doing all the time, he's apologetic, and he tries to keep people safe the best he can.
"Now the rest of the people in the school might be afraid of fire and they're all smart enough to know that fire burns, sure, but they don't want to dislike their classmates for their powers alone. In this instance, with our fire bugs, we got two very different people with the same powers. One of those people, in my opinion, comes across as someone I might be willing to trust easier and give him a chance to work on his control and get some help before I go running in the other direction just because I'm scared of fire. He tries his best to be careful and effort goes a long way. Do you see what I'm getting at here?"
Felix understood perfectly what Warren was saying. He just couldn't find a way to speak past the knot of tightness in his throat. Before people like Warren, like Jean-Paul and Philip, no one had ever thought very much of Felix. No one had ever believed in him. It was a powerful feeling, welling up emotion in his heart and his soul, threatening the high, heavy walls he had built up to keep just such a thing contained.
He'd only been eleven when he decided to shut out everyone else. That was a sudden decision, founded on traumatic events, but in Felix's mind it was the only way he could continue to survive. In the intervening years, it had become a part of him. He couldn't have known, four years before, how strong the power of gentleness and understanding could be.
Silently, Felix nodded his understanding, fighting against the lump in his throat that would be betrayed in his voice the moment he tried to speak. "Not... everybody... thinks that way," he managed, remembering some of the hard comments he'd seen in those first days when everyone was introducing themselves online. "But... you... really think you could figure out how to... trust me?"
"No, I suppose they don't." And if Warren was honest with himself, he'd readily admit that even he wasn't always so willing with every person that he met. However, he'd come to like Felix in the past few months he'd known him and, again, the younger boy reminded him so much of Andrew, so that was enough of a crutch that Warren would be willing to put forth some effort, too.
"But, yes, I would like to try. If I cross any boundaries or if it feels like I'm getting pushy about it, all you have to do is tell me to back off. I promise not to take it personally," Warren assured with a smile now.
Maybe, just maybe...
Maybe. Maybe if Warren knew ahead of time, maybe if he went into it with his eyes open. Maybe Felix could figure out how to control the worst aspects of his abilities. Maybe he could be friends with someone normally. Maybe.
The truth was that Warren's attention and the offer of his friendship was more tempting than Felix, starved for companionship and approval from others, could deny. He wanted Warren's regard desperately, and his will was simply not strong enough to resist that desire. Very, very hesitantly, Felix nodded. "I'd tell you. If it's... getting dangerous. And I'll work at controlling it."
"All right, that sounds like a deal for us, then," Warren concluded with a nod, leaning his head back against the wall and smiling softly. "Thanks for being so honest, by the way. I'm sure that wasn't easy for you."
It wasn't easy at all. Most of the words Felix had spoken had felt like broken glass in his throat, but he'd had to speak them anyway. It left him feeling torn up from the inside out, but he'd already put Warren through too much of his own shit. Warren didn't deserve another round of Felix's issues.
Shaking his head, Felix glanced down again. "Thanks for... listening. You didn't have to come down here with me."
"No, I didn't, but I wanted to. Besides, it's kind of nice to be able to get away from the crowd of people for a little while...somewhere the ice doesn't keep forming on my wings," Warren pointed out with a small laugh.
At long last, Felix managed to smile just a tiny bit. Warren had just offered him something he'd barely even dreamed of, and even if Felix wasn't sure he deserved it, he couldn't stay so somber. Not when Warren looked so pleased. "Then... this place can be our secret."
"Sure. The secret's safe with me."
With the snow getting as bad as it was, there really hadn't been all that much point in gliding around outside; Warren had found that he was freezing up much faster than he could flap his wings to shake the ice loose and that was a pretty good indication that the sky was off limits, for now. Needless to say, the feeling was more unbearable than he ever could have imagined. Since taking to the sky on a daily basis, he'd come to find that staying grounded for long periods of time made him restless and antsy, not to mention distracted as hell.
In an attempt to try and shake some of that off, Warren decided to stroll around the halls of the large building, wandering places he seldom went (or hadn't seen at all). Xavier had never stated that anywhere was off limits, minus the girls' wing of course, so it didn't make him feel too nosy. What he didn't expect to find was Felix near the end of one of the dimmer halls. Warren had very, very sharp eye sight thanks to his mutation, and even from the distance away he was able to notice how exhausted the younger boy looked. It made him frown.
"Felix?" he called curiously. "Everything all right down there?"
The slender, ghostly form creeping down the hall went quite still at the sound of his name. Always before, Felix had managed to escape the notice of everyone else in the school when he slipped off to his secreted places around the mansion. He couldn't turn invisible, or fade away to the astral plane, or hide in shadows like some of the other kids, but he had many years of practice in plainly, simply evading the notice of others. Being caught here by Warren (of all people, shit) quite disturbed Felix's equilibrium.
Since he couldn't simply disappear as he wanted to, Felix turned and inched away from the darker end of the hall, closer to the more lighted areas where Warren had paused. "It's fine," he answered, tucking his arms around himself. He was dressed as he had been for classes earlier in the day, but with a few layers of socks on his feet instead of shoes. "Did you get lost? It's colder down this way, I'm 'fraid."
"No. Was just restless and needed a walk, was all." Felix seemed a little more withdrawn than usual, Warren couldn't help but notice. Or maybe just quieter, it was hard to say, but maybe it was just because he'd gotten rather used to the slightly enthusiastic side of him that he often saw, when they discussed clothes and their other shared interests.
"Do you hang out down here often or something?" he asked gently.
Felix really didn't want to tell anybody about why he had been sneaking off. Damon already knew and that was more than enough. Only he was a terrible liar, and he knew it. "Sometimes," Felix answered, glancing away and down. "I guess I get... what you called it. Restless, too. It's quiet and people don't come down here much."
Before he said or did anything else, Warren asked: "did you want some company?"
When it came to Warren, Felix was pretty much defenseless. He couldn't think of any good reason to turn the older fellow down. Shyly, Felix shrugged one shoulder. "It's not very interesting back there," he admitted, sliding a few steps further away from the darkened hall. "I don't mind if you got nothin' better to do."
"I don't have anything better to do," Warren assured him with a small smile, and then took a few steps forward until he joined Felix. "Are we sitting or walking? I don't quite know my way around back here, so I'll take your word for which is best."
Felix hesitated, but this wasn't his only hiding spot. It wouldn't be the end of the world if one person knew about it... probably. "If you want, I can show you..." he offered, tilting his chin down the hall, curling a hand around the back of his neck. Had he been a girl, it would have been a very different kind of invitation.
"Sure, lead the way." There wasn't any apprehension or strangeness in Warren's tone, just friendly casualness. He didn't want to sound like he was snooping or overstepping his boundaries as a friend, even if he did sense that something was up. Hopefully it was a question that he would be able to work into the conversation naturally, and wouldn't scare Felix off.
"Every time I start walking around this place I swear I end up finding some place new to go. It reminds me of when I was a kid and home from boarding school; I was able to actually explore my father's house and I'd always try and find the dark little corners like this." He gestured around and then glanced down at Felix. "Silly little memories, I suppose."
The hall was rather shadowy, and Felix wasn't exactly a graceful ninja. He felt his way along the wall until he found the right doorway, just two steps past a soft creak in the floorboard. "Don't sound silly," he said quietly. "Sounds like it made you happy. Your house was really this big?"
A faint squeak of hinge preceded the opening of the door Felix had found, which led into a slightly less-shadowy room. Perhaps once, many years ago, these rooms had been for servants, but now they held cast-off furniture that had likely been removed once the downstairs rooms had been converted into classrooms. Sofas, chairs, occasional tables, all scattered around the room without thought to arrangement.
"A little bigger, actually. I've lived in boarding schools much more than my parents' home, though, so I'm just used to big homes in general. All of them mysterious, which was always neat."
Warren followed Felix inside and let the door close behind them. His first thought was that it smelled very dusty in there and it was a wonder that he hadn't been sent into a sneezing fit. Somehow he managed not to, and smiled instead. "This is neat, too. This some kind of storage room, or something?"
"Maybe." Felix didn't know what it was, exactly, but the furniture was a hodge-podge of eras and styles that didn't even remotely fit together. "There's places like this around the house, where nobody goes. They're quiet. I had to clean up some of the dust."
The reason why became evident when Felix made his careful way around to the edge of the room near a large, time-darkened window. There, he had constructed himself a cozy little nest of cushions and a blanket, with the furniture arranged nearby so it couldn't be seen by someone looking in from the hall. When Felix came to a halt before his private dream-fort, he paused, and kept his gaze angled away, like he was sharing a secret that he should somehow be ashamed of.
Warren's eyebrows furrowed inward when he saw the makeshift little resting area, not quite sure what to say. He wasn't appalled or confused, but a little bit curious. Maybe apprehensive, too, if only because he didn't want to offend Felix or upset him by asking the wrong thing. A sleeping spot away from your normal bed wasn't that out of line, not at all, but it could imply a number of different things.
So. Tread carefully.
"It's quieter here than in the dorms, hm?" At least that was a truth that just about anyone here could agree with.
It certainly was quiet. Even the wind outside the window seemed muffled. Felix peered out, squinting a bit, though it wasn't easy to see much of anything -- hence, it wasn't easy to see inside, either.
"Mmhm. And Philip don't... doesn't know about it. He doesn't like it if I sleep too much. He thinks it's like running away, and not in the 'run and live to fight another day' kind 'f way."
"Because of your powers?" Warren questioned, just for clarification. Admittedy, he didn't know all that much about Felix's abilities and didn't want to make any assumptions about them, but he did want to try and understand it.
Felix nodded, not speaking right away. He'd held so many secrets for such a long time, because it seemed so much safer that way. If he didn't reveal anything of himself, then he couldn't develop the emotional closeness needed to be able to do... he things that Felix could do. Those secrets protected not only him, but the people around him. Letting any of them go just felt so dangerous.
"Right," said Felix more quietly, moving a couple of steps and toying with the old drapes around the window. "If I'm dreaming, then... I'm somewhere else. My own place. I've been going there so long, sometimes I like it more than being awake. That's what Philip thinks is... not so great."
Warren pursed his lips together; without the more detailed context, it was easy to say that Philip could go and fuck himself and to encourage Felix to do whatever it was that he wanted to do. However, some forms of escapism, no matter how innocent they seemed, could still be destructive so Warren didn't jump to it right away.
"What do you think? Is it not so great?" he asked instead.
What did he think? Felix blinked up at Warren, a little bit blankly. He still wasn't used to being asked such things. His answer came out of his mouth soft and ragged, slipping back into his natural Ozark accent. "Don't have nowhere else to go."
"You don't have anywhere else to go to sleep soundly or you don't have anywhere to go to feel safe and secure? Or both?" Warren questioned further. His tone was not at all accusatory, and remained soft.
Felix rolled one shoulder, not quite a shrug, but not quite a meaningful gesture, either. "It's not having the place to sleep," he tried to explain. "I have a couple of places. It's the place I go when I'm dreamin'. It's like... my home. Even though I made it all up, even the people there, it's really mine. That's where I can be safe."
Warren nodded, chewing his lower lip thoughtfully as he slid down the wall to sit on the floor, wings bellowing out on the carpet around him. It was comfy in here, admittedly, and he didn't mind staying for a while longer at all---not if Felix didn't.
"Well I suppose then that Phil only has reason to be concerned if you're going in and not coming back out, you know? But I think sometimes it's okay to want to escape the real world for awhile, especially when it gets ugly," Warren mused and glanced up at the younger boy. "You have to take care of yourself, not just physically but up in your head too. Everyone has something that they do for that...everyone. You're no different and that's okay."
Felix looked startled when he turned back to Warren, like nobody had ever told him he was okay in his lifetime. He definitely had never expected anyone to forgive his escapism into his dreamworld so quickly and easily. That was his secret, and Felix had learned in a most direct and painful way that secrets were something to be ashamed of.
He slid down into a crouch, draping his arms around his knees with his back against the cool window. "You don't... you don't think it's running away?"
"Maybe a little. Like I said, though, it really depends on how you go about doing it, you know? And I still think that people need to do things to cope in their own little ways," Warren mused, sounding certain of himself. "You still need to come back to the real world and you need to acknowledge that what's important is out here. You can't run and hide from here forever, but it's okay to take a break every now and then. Do you do what I mean by that?"
There were worse ways to escape--ways that could be very self destructive or even harmful to other people. Yes, it was possible for Felix to harm his mental state by hiding out for long periods of time and letting this fake world of his completely overpower the real word. As far as Warren knew, though, he wasn't doing that completely. It just didn't seem right to say that going to his dream world at all in any way was a terrible thing. Warren tried to equate it, in a weird way, to his own need to be off of the ground, in the sky, and away from civilisation throughout the day. His powers made it so that he needed to go out and fly and be free from other responsibilities in his life, and maybe Felix's powers had a similar thing? Maybe more intense and definitely more powerful, no question there, but they were all unique in the sense that they had to do things for themselves to remain sustained. Or so it seemed, anyway.
Obviously, Felix had to live in the waking world. He was living in it right at that moment. Only his dream life was so tempting, so warm and secure in a way that his real life never had been, that the times when Felix didn't want to escape to that other world were few and far between.
"I guess," he answered, quietly, after a few seconds' thought. "I wanted... when that girl with the wings got shot, I wanted to go there forever. I really did. If people hate her just for flying, they're gonna really hate it when they find out there's some of us that can get in their minds and mess around. Unless I can hide somehow, I'm... it don't look good for me, you know?"
"I know." Warren agreed with that sentiment exactly. For him it was kind of cut and dry, really; Elaine Dupree was a girl with wings who could fly...just like Warren. Because of that, he had a pretty good idea as to how the world would react to him, as harmless as he was. Comparatively. Knowing the people in this school and how many of them looked more frightening and were legitimately more frightening in terms of what their powers could do? It was pretty fucking bleak.
"But you didn't go in there forever, and that's the difference. If you can keep yourself grounded and in control enough to bring yourself back out again and not become some dream world hermit guy, then there's no harm in visiting there, Felix." Warren offered a very faint smile. "And if you ask me, this whole shooting thing...it's hard to deal with. It's a big deal and I'd be pretty concerned if it wasn't bothering people."
Then again, it wasn't good if it was really tearing people apart, either. "How are you dealing with it now?"
Silently, Felix studied his feet and shrugged, the gesture of a child who has done something wrong but can't express why. Damon had taken away the only other thing Felix really had to cope with fear and anxiety. Even though Felix knew it was better for him that he didn't want the drugs any more, it had left a kind of blank space that he wasn't sure how to fill.
"I guess I try not to think about it. I've been tryin'... Philip said I should try to think about what I could do that would make me really happy. Haven't come up with much, yet. But..." Felix's chin lifted the tiniest bit. "Eames was saying how anybody could learn how to hide. Maybe not as good as him, but like that. Become, you know, somebody else." Somebody better. Anybody would be better.
"You'd really want to be someone else?" Warren asked gently, leaning his head back against the wall.
"Shit, yes," Felix breathed, his eyes widening. "Nobody knows who I am. Nobody cares who I end up being. If I could just... cut away everything before I came here? That's what'd make me for-real happy."
"But the past makes you who you are; everything you've learned, everything that's hardened you and strengthened you comes from experience." Warren bit his lip and then lulled his head to the side to eye Felix curiously. Carefully. "I don't know everything you've been through, I know. I'm sorry if there's something in there that's traumatic and painful...learning experience or not, no one deserves that.
"Okay I realise not everything about the past is a good thing. Maybe another way to look at it is...if you could survive everything so far in your life up until this point, all of this mutant stuff is just another hurdle, you know? Something else you'll survive."
"I didn't do anything special," Felix argued, but without any heat behind it. Philip had said something similar, and the idea had rattled Felix so much that he hadn't really been able to think about it. "I ai... I'm not hard and I'm not strong. I..."
He caught himself before he could spill out any more awkward truths. Already, Felix had given away too much. Already, Warren knew more than Felix wanted him to know. No matter how much Felix might want such an open, understanding and beautiful friend, he knew that he couldn't have it. His abilities were far too dangerous to risk exposing Warren to what he could do. He just couldn't reveal any more of his true thoughts and feelings, couldn't allow anything like an emotional bond to develop between them.
Closing his eyes briefly, Felix breathed a quiet sigh. "I don't know. It probably makes no sense to you. You're everything that anybody would want to be. I probably sound crazy to you."
Warren winced and moved his head back to the wall so that he was staring out straight again. Inwardly he was chiding himself for pressing too much, making assumptions, and everything else. It was not his place and there was such thing as overstepping one's boundaries. Felix's comment about him being everything everyone else wanted to be, though? That bothered Warren a lot. He hated when people said shit like that to him (because this was far from the first time), but he knew better than to throw a little fit about it.
He was privileged. He knew it and so did everyone else.
"You don't...you don't sound crazy," Warren murmured quietly. "I'm sorry, okay? I shouldn't have assumed anything."
Shit. Sometimes, Felix almost wished Warren wasn't so nice to him, so patient and accepting of him. With Victor or Jean-Paul, Felix didn't have much problem keeping them at arms' length, knowing that it was for the best. It was different with Warren. Felix wanted desperately for the other boy to like him, even while being painfully aware of how dangerous that could be. That longing feeling , blended with Warren's natural kindness, left Felix in a state of helpless adoration.
"You don't need to be sorry. You're not... so far off about me," he admitted, his voice just as soft. "You're sweet, to say what you said. And to listen to me being weird."
Sometimes Warren swore that Felix reminded him more and more of Andrew by the day. Andrew used to hold back a lot and tried to avoid talking about the things that bothered him. He also had these dark secrets that he'd fought tooth and nail to avoid letting slip. On the outside, he had been this skinny, mostly defenseless kid that other people thought was weird and they liked to pick on him. Not Warren. Somehow the two of them had ended up being best friends, and now they couldn't even keep in touch.
That wasn't to say that Felix was some kind of stand in---because he wasn't. Felix was his own person and for as many similarities as he had to Andrew, there were differences too. It just felt so natural and not-so-odd for Warren to hang out and converse with Felix because of those similarities, that was all.
"Ah, I'll listen. Contrary to popular belief, I do like to make the attempt to be half decent at it," Warren replied in an attempt to assure Felix it was really not a big deal at all. "I'm still sorry, though, and I'm still going to insist that you're not so weird, so come off it."
Have a friendly smile for your troubles.
That smile just twisted Felix all up on the inside. He was definitely glad that Warren was straight. Felix wasn't ready to think about being attracted to people all on his own, not just yet.
He was also glad that his storage-room hideaway was somewhat dim, so maybe Warren wouldn't see the pink flush he knew was rising in his face. "Probably not a very popular belief," Felix tried not to mumble. Keeping careful control of his words and his accent was still important. "I've never heard anybody say anything but good things about you. And, you know... I'm pretty sure it's 'cause you're a nice person, and not 'cause of your name."
"Sometimes it takes quite a bit of effort to sway someone's opinion of you. I don't mind putting forth the effort for it, if I may be honest," Warren confessed, gaze still fixed on his younger friend. The blush colouring Felix's cheeks was, in fact, easy for him to see thanks to his mutated eye sight, but Warren had manners and would not call him out on it; that would be unnecessarily rude.
"But other people's opinions aren't everything, at the same time; popular opinion's overrated. I don't care what anyone else thinks of you, Felix. I'd like to consider you a friend."
If Warren had been like Tessa or Ellie, a telepath with strong mental barriers, if he didn't have those beautiful broad white wings, then Felix would have liked that, too. More than just about anything else he could imagine. For someone like him, an orphan from an impoverished stretch of lost countryside in the Midwest, to call Warren Worthington a friend... it sounded like a fairy tale. Like a dream that he might have constructed for himself.
"It's dangerous," Felix mumbled very softly. "Being friends with me. Not because of other people, but... just because of me."
"I could make the argument that it's dangerous being friends with many people...especially people here," Warren pointed out just as softly, and ducked his head a little to look Felix in the eye. "We don't have to be friends if you don't feel comfortable with it, but I'm at least going to put it out there that I'm not against a few risks."
As little as Felix wanted to tell Warren the truth, guilt was going to eat away at him if he led the other boy on in a lie. He looked downright miserable, staring down at the ground as he hugged one knee into his chest. "I won't hold you to it," Felix promised quietly. "If you change your mind. It's not just dreams I can control, it's people's minds. It's just harder when I'm awake, so... Professor Xavier says I got to have an 'emotional bond' first. Means it's just my friends whose minds I can take control of."
His voice dwindled away to little more than a whisper, and his body tensed, expecting an outburst of anger and betrayal.
It would have to take an abnormal level of idiocy to not be at least slightly put off by the idea of mind control; no matter how nice the person was, how careful they were, or what the circumstances happened to be, that power was terrifying. On the other hand, it wasn't like Felix got to choose what his power was and it wasn't really fair to think that he needed to be condemned to a life of isolation. Hell, no one did.
"Is Professor Xavier helping you control it?" Warren questioned.
Without looking up, Felix nodded slowly. "He's trying. I'm not very good. Everything's harder when I'm awake. Asleep, I can turn it off, no problem. Awake, it just... happens."
"It does happen overnight for everyone," Warren reasoned. "And it's...no reason to have to force yourself to be alone. I can't really imagine how freaky it must be for you, but come on. At least give yourself a chance."
Felix was quiet for a few moments. His powers weren't the only reason he kept other people at bay, just the strongest, and the most convenient. The secrets he kept also kept all of the power in his own hands. Felix had the power to decide if he could be close to another person or not. Felix got to choose. As soon as he told another person what he could do, then they could choose for themselves... and Felix was powerless again. Lowering his guard enough to be himself around someone else, someone who didn't have the mental shielding to keep him out like Tessa or Ellie did, seemed like a pipe dream.
As much of a dream as a dirt-poor hick orphan from the Ozarks becoming friends with someone like Warren.
"You don't think you'll end up wondering if you're making your own choices, or if I'm making them for you?" he asked quietly. "You wouldn't really know. Everybody shuts that Damon guy out. He's not much different than me. Just more honest about it."
That was a very fair argument. "Everyone shuts Damon out not just because he's honest but because he's malicious. He's a bully. Even powers aside, all you have to do is look on the network and see how he treats people and it's fairly obvious that he gets off on harming people."
That guy could have been a speedster or a telekinetic or even just a flyer and people still would not have liked or trusted him. However, Damon had a vicious, powerful ability that only helped him manipulate and abuse people further and that was why people were scared of him or didn't want to give even a minute amount of trust to him.
"All right let me give you another scenario. You could have two people with the power to create and manipulate fire, okay? The first one might be a pyromaniac and get a kick out of watching things burn, while the second might be scared of the damage their fire causes and they think about their power when they use it--not just how it might burn people, but how smoke might affect people, how the temperature works, or if they're a danger to the structure everyone is standing in. The first guy might have exquisite control and uses that control to cause very defined mayhem. The second guy might not have the best control and has an accident every now and then, but he still stays very aware of what he's doing all the time, he's apologetic, and he tries to keep people safe the best he can.
"Now the rest of the people in the school might be afraid of fire and they're all smart enough to know that fire burns, sure, but they don't want to dislike their classmates for their powers alone. In this instance, with our fire bugs, we got two very different people with the same powers. One of those people, in my opinion, comes across as someone I might be willing to trust easier and give him a chance to work on his control and get some help before I go running in the other direction just because I'm scared of fire. He tries his best to be careful and effort goes a long way. Do you see what I'm getting at here?"
Felix understood perfectly what Warren was saying. He just couldn't find a way to speak past the knot of tightness in his throat. Before people like Warren, like Jean-Paul and Philip, no one had ever thought very much of Felix. No one had ever believed in him. It was a powerful feeling, welling up emotion in his heart and his soul, threatening the high, heavy walls he had built up to keep just such a thing contained.
He'd only been eleven when he decided to shut out everyone else. That was a sudden decision, founded on traumatic events, but in Felix's mind it was the only way he could continue to survive. In the intervening years, it had become a part of him. He couldn't have known, four years before, how strong the power of gentleness and understanding could be.
Silently, Felix nodded his understanding, fighting against the lump in his throat that would be betrayed in his voice the moment he tried to speak. "Not... everybody... thinks that way," he managed, remembering some of the hard comments he'd seen in those first days when everyone was introducing themselves online. "But... you... really think you could figure out how to... trust me?"
"No, I suppose they don't." And if Warren was honest with himself, he'd readily admit that even he wasn't always so willing with every person that he met. However, he'd come to like Felix in the past few months he'd known him and, again, the younger boy reminded him so much of Andrew, so that was enough of a crutch that Warren would be willing to put forth some effort, too.
"But, yes, I would like to try. If I cross any boundaries or if it feels like I'm getting pushy about it, all you have to do is tell me to back off. I promise not to take it personally," Warren assured with a smile now.
Maybe, just maybe...
Maybe. Maybe if Warren knew ahead of time, maybe if he went into it with his eyes open. Maybe Felix could figure out how to control the worst aspects of his abilities. Maybe he could be friends with someone normally. Maybe.
The truth was that Warren's attention and the offer of his friendship was more tempting than Felix, starved for companionship and approval from others, could deny. He wanted Warren's regard desperately, and his will was simply not strong enough to resist that desire. Very, very hesitantly, Felix nodded. "I'd tell you. If it's... getting dangerous. And I'll work at controlling it."
"All right, that sounds like a deal for us, then," Warren concluded with a nod, leaning his head back against the wall and smiling softly. "Thanks for being so honest, by the way. I'm sure that wasn't easy for you."
It wasn't easy at all. Most of the words Felix had spoken had felt like broken glass in his throat, but he'd had to speak them anyway. It left him feeling torn up from the inside out, but he'd already put Warren through too much of his own shit. Warren didn't deserve another round of Felix's issues.
Shaking his head, Felix glanced down again. "Thanks for... listening. You didn't have to come down here with me."
"No, I didn't, but I wanted to. Besides, it's kind of nice to be able to get away from the crowd of people for a little while...somewhere the ice doesn't keep forming on my wings," Warren pointed out with a small laugh.
At long last, Felix managed to smile just a tiny bit. Warren had just offered him something he'd barely even dreamed of, and even if Felix wasn't sure he deserved it, he couldn't stay so somber. Not when Warren looked so pleased. "Then... this place can be our secret."
"Sure. The secret's safe with me."
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