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om_mainFox triumphantly announces that he's discovered a clue about the secondhand cravat that caused him and Felix to meet last year. The boys make plans to undertake an adventure!
It had been a long time since the cravat Fox had received from Felix, saturated in memories and emotions that the other boy wanted to unravel, had been anywhere near the top of his priority list. He'd tried fairly frequently after he'd first taken it, but the garment had consistently stonewalled him, flooding his mind with intense but ultimately useless information about its former owner's life, and eventually his own life had taken precedence. When so much was happening in the present, it was difficult to remain focused on the past. But every now and again he still tried and this time the stubborn piece of cloth had given him something. An epiphany. A name.
He'd hit his bedroom door at a run and darted up the hall to Felix's room, where he drummed a few rapid-fire knocks on the door. Maybe it was a stupid thing to be excited about, but hey, little victories right? "Hey Fix," he called through the door, "I've got good news!" That might be a bit of an overstatement. "Well. I've got news, anyway!"
Other than missing the pretty fabric that went so nicely with his plum sweater, Felix had entirely forgotten about two things: first that Fox had his cravat, and second that Fox had given him that nickname. 'Fix' was what he had dubbed the wild fox that he and Caius had found, and for the oddest moment, Felix thought that was who his classmate was calling out in the hall.
But, no, it was him. Felix wasn't accustomed to having nicknames. The door to his room was opened a bit belatedly, and only a two-inch crack so Felix could peek out, at first. On confirming it was Fox (Mulder, not the animal), he opened the door the rest of the way, curious as to what had his classmate in such a state. "Well, now I'm sure the whole wing is very curious. Hello, Fox."
By the time the door opened some of Fox's enthusiasm had been dampened by impatience, but not much, and he smirked. Little jabs like that rolled off of him like raindrops on feathers. "Well first," he said, holding out the cravat in gloved hands, "For you. And second, I got a name." He said this like it was a significant accomplishment which, in his mind, it was. It had certainly taken long enough. "I thought I'd let you do the honors," he added, gesturing past Felix to the computer he could see perched on the desk inside and all but inviting himself in.
Felix stepped back and let Fox come in, which he didn't seem to mind. His attention was mostly on the scarf for a moment, his expression brightening once it was back in his hands. That definitely warmed him further to Fox's sudden presence, and he looked up to follow the other boy's gaze.
"Oh," he said quietly, "That's Philip's. He'd rather I didn't use it. I... oh!" The quiet disappeared in a burst of enthusiasm, as Felix draped the cravat loosely around his own neck, and trotted to the nightstand by his bed to fetch something lying there. "I have one of those phones from Tony. It has the Internet! What should I look for?"
It was rewarding to see Felix's subdued disposition change and Fox took a seat on the bed that looked less it belonged to the uptight Phil, nodding. Anything that came from Tony would probably put a normal computer to shame anyway. "Andrew Liam Dirkse," he supplied, lifting one hand to gesture to the scarf and then making an absent salute with his fingers, "That's the guy who owned it before you. Anthony's partner. Lucky for us, he spent some time in the military. Name and service number, private."
The difference in Philip's side and Felix's side was, indeed, marked. While both were quite neat and orderly, Felix had an eclectic collection of thrift-store treasures and glossy magazine photos, while Philip's belongings were more austere. One of them had never really owned things before, and the other lived frequently on the move. It showed in how they curated their space.
Perching at the opposite end of his bed from Fox, Felix was quickly enthralled with the other boy's revelation. While he tapped the phone to pull up the correct app, he glanced down curiously at the boldly-colored patterns on the cloth. "Really? A soldier? I always thought military..." Tellingly, Felix glanced over at Philip's side of the room, hospital corners and all.
Fox's eyes followed Felix's and he laughed as if a private joke had just passed between them. Then he shrugged and said, "It takes all kinds? Anyway, depending on his age he might've been drafted. I rarely get the full story and...well. You know how agreeable that thing's been so far." He leaned in, peeking over the other boy's shoulder as he found his way to a browser. His instinct had been to do all of the digging by himself, but given that the scarf belonged to Felix it hadn't seemed right to leave him out of it once they had a lead.
Felix was a bit slower than many of his peers with electronics, but once he'd paused and drawn his glasses from his shirt pocket and put them on, it went more quickly. He tapped in the name Fox had given him, hesitating for a moment over how to spell the last name. Well, if he didn't get it right the first time, they could try again.
As soon as he touched the button to search, Felix bit his lip with excitement, and held the screen out toward Fox. "Oh, I don't know if I can look! It's too thrilling."
Fox couldn't help grinning at Felix's demure brand of excitement. He took the phone and peered down into the screen, but lost his smile as he noticed the third result down on the list; a small digital snippet from a local Salem Center paper that appeared to be the man's obituary. Not surprising, really, given where his treasured belonging had ended up, but...potentially a bit of rain on the other boy's parade. He clicked the link and read the lines through a few times before looking at Felix. "Well," he reported slowly, "He died about eighteen months ago. No mention of his partner here, though. No mention of any family at all." He returned to the browser, scrolling through some of the other results, but there wasn't much. The guy hadn't left much of an Internet footprint. Not even a Facebook page.
Inch by inch, Felix scooted closer, peeking at the screen himself. He usually kept his distance from other people, but the screen was small, and Felix was intensely curious. "But we know he did have a partner. When he was younger, at least. Right? The one that gave Andrew the cravat in the first place." It had been awhile, but Felix thought he remembered what little of the story Fox had known then. Maybe, though, it was really the story that Felix had told himself. He couldn't always tell the difference.
"Maybe, if he was older, and in the military, they couldn't... really be together. Do you think?"
Aware of Felix's proximity and skittish tendencies, Fox was careful not to move too suddenly as he turned to look at him and nodded his head. That made sense. Most of the memories had seemed older; the other man had been young and dressed in outdated fashions (though he was hardly the expert there). But not entirely and he distinctly remembered seeing the man's hair starting to gray. He frowned thoughtfully. "Maybe. But they've seen each other since then too. Somewhere along the way. It's hard for me to tell."
"It's... sad," Felix observed, quietly. That was a wide leap, for him. Empathy was difficult when one spent as much time protecting oneself as Felix did. But now the story wasn't as much about his secondhand scarf being haunted and Fox's startling reaction to it. Now it was about two people who had cared about each other, and something had gone wrong.
Some of the older students had started talking about how they could use their powers to help people. Felix had always thought that his could only be used to hurt people. Maybe that wasn't completely true.
Something on the tiny browser screen caught his eye, and he pushed his glasses up his nose out of habit. "That sentence, there. Isn't that the cemetery in Salem Center? Ellie likes that place, she's told me about it."
Despite himself, Fox quirked a grin at mention of the gothic Ellie and her taste in graveyards, then said, "Well. She would know." Honestly, though, he couldn't imagine what would make one cemetery superior to another or, in fact, superior to any place at all. He wasn't afraid of them, but he didn't like them, especially now that his missing sister had a headstone in one that marked nothing at all except his parents eagerness to forget her. He scanned the obituary again, then nodded curtly, "But I think you're right. It's not far at all."
Though it wasn't a secret around the school, and Felix had become more comfortable with the fact in the past year, he still considered his words with some thought before he spoke. At last, he explained, "Part of my power is that I can see ghosts. For a long time, I wasn't sure they were real, but now I know that they are. It seems, maybe... if we really want to know what happened, and give this back to the man Andrew cared about, we might be able to go ask him."
Shortly after coming to Xavier's, Fox had made it his business to know as much about his peers' powers as he could without sneaking into the med lab and hacking the files (and even that thought had crossed his mind, however briefly), so Felix's revelation didn't surprise him. He did, however, feel immensely stupid for not coming to that conclusion himself, especially when his regular partner in crime had a similar ability. He caught himself before he could slap his own forehead, then nodded quickly in agreement, "Go directly to the source. I like it. And I'm always up for a field trip."
"Philip might take us," Felix mused thoughtfully. "Or Eames definitely would." He knew that it meant leaving the safety of Xavier's, and using his power in public for the first time... even if it was in a cemetery, surrounded by no one who could tell the world that there was a skinny redhead teenager who spoke to ghosts. Felix had gone all the way to Paris and not been discovered; perhaps he could go to a deserted part of a small town and not be discovered there, either.
"It won't seem like much of anything," he added, hedging a little bit. "If you don't have astral powers you can't really see mine at all."
"Not a fan of good old public transit?" Fox asked, raising his eyebrows at the prospect. It wasn't that he disliked his peers, but it seemed unnecessary to rope in a third conspirator and...well, there were always interesting people on the bus. It appealed to his more curious (and more nosy) nature. Then he shrugged and smiled at the other boy, "That's probably good. It'll be easier to pretend like we belong there if you aren't manifesting specters or speaking in tongues. And I can be your lookout."
"I don't do anything like that," Felix assured him, taking Fox seriously. He pressed his mouth into a line, and then added, "I've never taken public transportation. Isn't it all terribly confusing, and... you know. Unsavory?"
Fox couldn't help being amused by Felix's serious response, but he did manage not to show it. Instead, he jumped to the more important point. "Never?" he pressed, "I think I'm duty-bound to fix that! It can be unsavory, sure, but that's what makes it interesting. Plus, how else are the age-impaired and car-less like ourselves supposed to get around?" Apart from hitch-hiking. Which had the potential to be way more 'unsavory'.
"I thought that's what Philip was for," Felix responded, perfectly innocent. He tilted his head slightly. "After all, isn't your roommate Warren? You need to learn about utilizing your available resources." Some of the seriousness melted away, at the end of that statement, into a little smile to show he was teasing just the tiniest bit.
"Only if you want to be dependent on somebody else," Fox pointed out, making a face that showed this was entirely unacceptable, "Besides, knowing my luck, I'd go to borrow the limo or whatever and he'd be in Paris for the weekend anyway. It happens. Being ready to get there on your own just makes sense."
Felix did his best not to look bewildered. Independence was not something he had a lot of practice at. Someone had told him what to do for most of his life, and even in the last year and a half at Xavier's, he'd had help and guidance and assistance from nearly everyone he met without even asking for it. He really didn't even recognize his own dependence on others; it simply never occurred to him. "Well, if you'll show me how to take the bus, then I suppose it can't be that hard to figure it out."
He nibbled on his lower lip for a moment, then asked, "Are there a lot of people on the bus?"
An expression of satisfied triumph emerged on Fox's face and he clapped Felix lightly on the back, "That's the spirit. We'll take the bus down, talk to some dead people, solve the mystery. All in a day's work." He paused, lowering his hand as he noticed the other boy's trepidation. But then, what didn't put him on edge? "Well. That depends on when you go. Rush hour, sure, yeah. But otherwise, this town's not too big." He considered, then added, "You can have the window seat?"
Felix's glance darted toward Fox's hand when the other boy touched him, which was strange, but he very carefully didn't let himself react. Already he had the sense that he was being kind of weird, and he didn't need to compound that by jerking away from someone trying to be friendly. Instead, he tried to smile, because Fox really was rather sweet, and what was more, he treated Felix like Felix was normal -- even when it was obvious that he wasn't. That was nice.
"All right. We can go on the weekend? I don't need to miss any more classes."
When it came to an investigation, Fox typically found waiting difficult to tolerate, but given that it had already been months and this was Felix's mystery he opted not to protest. Besides, it's not like the guy was going anywhere. He nodded and smiled back. "Deal."
It had been a long time since the cravat Fox had received from Felix, saturated in memories and emotions that the other boy wanted to unravel, had been anywhere near the top of his priority list. He'd tried fairly frequently after he'd first taken it, but the garment had consistently stonewalled him, flooding his mind with intense but ultimately useless information about its former owner's life, and eventually his own life had taken precedence. When so much was happening in the present, it was difficult to remain focused on the past. But every now and again he still tried and this time the stubborn piece of cloth had given him something. An epiphany. A name.
He'd hit his bedroom door at a run and darted up the hall to Felix's room, where he drummed a few rapid-fire knocks on the door. Maybe it was a stupid thing to be excited about, but hey, little victories right? "Hey Fix," he called through the door, "I've got good news!" That might be a bit of an overstatement. "Well. I've got news, anyway!"
Other than missing the pretty fabric that went so nicely with his plum sweater, Felix had entirely forgotten about two things: first that Fox had his cravat, and second that Fox had given him that nickname. 'Fix' was what he had dubbed the wild fox that he and Caius had found, and for the oddest moment, Felix thought that was who his classmate was calling out in the hall.
But, no, it was him. Felix wasn't accustomed to having nicknames. The door to his room was opened a bit belatedly, and only a two-inch crack so Felix could peek out, at first. On confirming it was Fox (Mulder, not the animal), he opened the door the rest of the way, curious as to what had his classmate in such a state. "Well, now I'm sure the whole wing is very curious. Hello, Fox."
By the time the door opened some of Fox's enthusiasm had been dampened by impatience, but not much, and he smirked. Little jabs like that rolled off of him like raindrops on feathers. "Well first," he said, holding out the cravat in gloved hands, "For you. And second, I got a name." He said this like it was a significant accomplishment which, in his mind, it was. It had certainly taken long enough. "I thought I'd let you do the honors," he added, gesturing past Felix to the computer he could see perched on the desk inside and all but inviting himself in.
Felix stepped back and let Fox come in, which he didn't seem to mind. His attention was mostly on the scarf for a moment, his expression brightening once it was back in his hands. That definitely warmed him further to Fox's sudden presence, and he looked up to follow the other boy's gaze.
"Oh," he said quietly, "That's Philip's. He'd rather I didn't use it. I... oh!" The quiet disappeared in a burst of enthusiasm, as Felix draped the cravat loosely around his own neck, and trotted to the nightstand by his bed to fetch something lying there. "I have one of those phones from Tony. It has the Internet! What should I look for?"
It was rewarding to see Felix's subdued disposition change and Fox took a seat on the bed that looked less it belonged to the uptight Phil, nodding. Anything that came from Tony would probably put a normal computer to shame anyway. "Andrew Liam Dirkse," he supplied, lifting one hand to gesture to the scarf and then making an absent salute with his fingers, "That's the guy who owned it before you. Anthony's partner. Lucky for us, he spent some time in the military. Name and service number, private."
The difference in Philip's side and Felix's side was, indeed, marked. While both were quite neat and orderly, Felix had an eclectic collection of thrift-store treasures and glossy magazine photos, while Philip's belongings were more austere. One of them had never really owned things before, and the other lived frequently on the move. It showed in how they curated their space.
Perching at the opposite end of his bed from Fox, Felix was quickly enthralled with the other boy's revelation. While he tapped the phone to pull up the correct app, he glanced down curiously at the boldly-colored patterns on the cloth. "Really? A soldier? I always thought military..." Tellingly, Felix glanced over at Philip's side of the room, hospital corners and all.
Fox's eyes followed Felix's and he laughed as if a private joke had just passed between them. Then he shrugged and said, "It takes all kinds? Anyway, depending on his age he might've been drafted. I rarely get the full story and...well. You know how agreeable that thing's been so far." He leaned in, peeking over the other boy's shoulder as he found his way to a browser. His instinct had been to do all of the digging by himself, but given that the scarf belonged to Felix it hadn't seemed right to leave him out of it once they had a lead.
Felix was a bit slower than many of his peers with electronics, but once he'd paused and drawn his glasses from his shirt pocket and put them on, it went more quickly. He tapped in the name Fox had given him, hesitating for a moment over how to spell the last name. Well, if he didn't get it right the first time, they could try again.
As soon as he touched the button to search, Felix bit his lip with excitement, and held the screen out toward Fox. "Oh, I don't know if I can look! It's too thrilling."
Fox couldn't help grinning at Felix's demure brand of excitement. He took the phone and peered down into the screen, but lost his smile as he noticed the third result down on the list; a small digital snippet from a local Salem Center paper that appeared to be the man's obituary. Not surprising, really, given where his treasured belonging had ended up, but...potentially a bit of rain on the other boy's parade. He clicked the link and read the lines through a few times before looking at Felix. "Well," he reported slowly, "He died about eighteen months ago. No mention of his partner here, though. No mention of any family at all." He returned to the browser, scrolling through some of the other results, but there wasn't much. The guy hadn't left much of an Internet footprint. Not even a Facebook page.
Inch by inch, Felix scooted closer, peeking at the screen himself. He usually kept his distance from other people, but the screen was small, and Felix was intensely curious. "But we know he did have a partner. When he was younger, at least. Right? The one that gave Andrew the cravat in the first place." It had been awhile, but Felix thought he remembered what little of the story Fox had known then. Maybe, though, it was really the story that Felix had told himself. He couldn't always tell the difference.
"Maybe, if he was older, and in the military, they couldn't... really be together. Do you think?"
Aware of Felix's proximity and skittish tendencies, Fox was careful not to move too suddenly as he turned to look at him and nodded his head. That made sense. Most of the memories had seemed older; the other man had been young and dressed in outdated fashions (though he was hardly the expert there). But not entirely and he distinctly remembered seeing the man's hair starting to gray. He frowned thoughtfully. "Maybe. But they've seen each other since then too. Somewhere along the way. It's hard for me to tell."
"It's... sad," Felix observed, quietly. That was a wide leap, for him. Empathy was difficult when one spent as much time protecting oneself as Felix did. But now the story wasn't as much about his secondhand scarf being haunted and Fox's startling reaction to it. Now it was about two people who had cared about each other, and something had gone wrong.
Some of the older students had started talking about how they could use their powers to help people. Felix had always thought that his could only be used to hurt people. Maybe that wasn't completely true.
Something on the tiny browser screen caught his eye, and he pushed his glasses up his nose out of habit. "That sentence, there. Isn't that the cemetery in Salem Center? Ellie likes that place, she's told me about it."
Despite himself, Fox quirked a grin at mention of the gothic Ellie and her taste in graveyards, then said, "Well. She would know." Honestly, though, he couldn't imagine what would make one cemetery superior to another or, in fact, superior to any place at all. He wasn't afraid of them, but he didn't like them, especially now that his missing sister had a headstone in one that marked nothing at all except his parents eagerness to forget her. He scanned the obituary again, then nodded curtly, "But I think you're right. It's not far at all."
Though it wasn't a secret around the school, and Felix had become more comfortable with the fact in the past year, he still considered his words with some thought before he spoke. At last, he explained, "Part of my power is that I can see ghosts. For a long time, I wasn't sure they were real, but now I know that they are. It seems, maybe... if we really want to know what happened, and give this back to the man Andrew cared about, we might be able to go ask him."
Shortly after coming to Xavier's, Fox had made it his business to know as much about his peers' powers as he could without sneaking into the med lab and hacking the files (and even that thought had crossed his mind, however briefly), so Felix's revelation didn't surprise him. He did, however, feel immensely stupid for not coming to that conclusion himself, especially when his regular partner in crime had a similar ability. He caught himself before he could slap his own forehead, then nodded quickly in agreement, "Go directly to the source. I like it. And I'm always up for a field trip."
"Philip might take us," Felix mused thoughtfully. "Or Eames definitely would." He knew that it meant leaving the safety of Xavier's, and using his power in public for the first time... even if it was in a cemetery, surrounded by no one who could tell the world that there was a skinny redhead teenager who spoke to ghosts. Felix had gone all the way to Paris and not been discovered; perhaps he could go to a deserted part of a small town and not be discovered there, either.
"It won't seem like much of anything," he added, hedging a little bit. "If you don't have astral powers you can't really see mine at all."
"Not a fan of good old public transit?" Fox asked, raising his eyebrows at the prospect. It wasn't that he disliked his peers, but it seemed unnecessary to rope in a third conspirator and...well, there were always interesting people on the bus. It appealed to his more curious (and more nosy) nature. Then he shrugged and smiled at the other boy, "That's probably good. It'll be easier to pretend like we belong there if you aren't manifesting specters or speaking in tongues. And I can be your lookout."
"I don't do anything like that," Felix assured him, taking Fox seriously. He pressed his mouth into a line, and then added, "I've never taken public transportation. Isn't it all terribly confusing, and... you know. Unsavory?"
Fox couldn't help being amused by Felix's serious response, but he did manage not to show it. Instead, he jumped to the more important point. "Never?" he pressed, "I think I'm duty-bound to fix that! It can be unsavory, sure, but that's what makes it interesting. Plus, how else are the age-impaired and car-less like ourselves supposed to get around?" Apart from hitch-hiking. Which had the potential to be way more 'unsavory'.
"I thought that's what Philip was for," Felix responded, perfectly innocent. He tilted his head slightly. "After all, isn't your roommate Warren? You need to learn about utilizing your available resources." Some of the seriousness melted away, at the end of that statement, into a little smile to show he was teasing just the tiniest bit.
"Only if you want to be dependent on somebody else," Fox pointed out, making a face that showed this was entirely unacceptable, "Besides, knowing my luck, I'd go to borrow the limo or whatever and he'd be in Paris for the weekend anyway. It happens. Being ready to get there on your own just makes sense."
Felix did his best not to look bewildered. Independence was not something he had a lot of practice at. Someone had told him what to do for most of his life, and even in the last year and a half at Xavier's, he'd had help and guidance and assistance from nearly everyone he met without even asking for it. He really didn't even recognize his own dependence on others; it simply never occurred to him. "Well, if you'll show me how to take the bus, then I suppose it can't be that hard to figure it out."
He nibbled on his lower lip for a moment, then asked, "Are there a lot of people on the bus?"
An expression of satisfied triumph emerged on Fox's face and he clapped Felix lightly on the back, "That's the spirit. We'll take the bus down, talk to some dead people, solve the mystery. All in a day's work." He paused, lowering his hand as he noticed the other boy's trepidation. But then, what didn't put him on edge? "Well. That depends on when you go. Rush hour, sure, yeah. But otherwise, this town's not too big." He considered, then added, "You can have the window seat?"
Felix's glance darted toward Fox's hand when the other boy touched him, which was strange, but he very carefully didn't let himself react. Already he had the sense that he was being kind of weird, and he didn't need to compound that by jerking away from someone trying to be friendly. Instead, he tried to smile, because Fox really was rather sweet, and what was more, he treated Felix like Felix was normal -- even when it was obvious that he wasn't. That was nice.
"All right. We can go on the weekend? I don't need to miss any more classes."
When it came to an investigation, Fox typically found waiting difficult to tolerate, but given that it had already been months and this was Felix's mystery he opted not to protest. Besides, it's not like the guy was going anywhere. He nodded and smiled back. "Deal."
