fandomhigh | Journalism Class - Tuesday November 1

Duce gives Jake another dark look, but it's impossible to stay annoyed at him, especially when he and Rory are having some sort of animated discussion and creating a forcefield of 'cute' on the other side of the classroom.

She shakes her head slightly, "Spider said we have to interview people that were there. We're tempted to use our extra credit to skate on it. Kinda cheating.. we live there, with Wednesday, and so we kinda have an 'in'." Pausing a beat, she amends, "Not that it really means anything, considering the nature of the place."

Looking Krycek over carefully, she frowns. "Really tired for a good reason or bad?"

Watching Jake and Rory for longer than is probably necessary, he finally turns back to Duce to answer her question, shrugging. "No idea. I have theories everywhere from 'maybe I'm not eating correctly' to 'the clone body I inhabit is about to expire', so I'm trying not to think about it too much."

Her attention is suddenly, fiercely focused on him. Every single snake on her head is pointing beady little reptilian eyes right at him. Lips compress slightly, worry dominating her brain. It takes a moment for her to formulate what she wants to say, but still comes out badly. "You are not allowed to expire, Alex Krycek. We will not allow it, and if necessary, we will march into Hades' realm and pry your soul from his cold black little fingers and stuff it into a less fragile vessel. And if you protest, we'll find a way to bind your soul to a soccer ball and kick you around for the rest of eternity."

Realizing that sounds absolutely psychopathic, she tries to cover by adding lightly, "Jake would be sad. He'd whine. He might even cry." She shudders for dramatic effect, "We would absolutely not be able to deal with a sad, crying Jake. So it's your duty to stay alive, damnit." She doesn't mention how much the thought of Krycek's death terrifies her. But considering she just threatened to march into hell and drag him back.. he's probably already gotten that clue.

She thinks of something.. Jake.. coffee.. lack of sleep, and asks suspiciously, "Have you been letting him feed you coffee late at night? The caffeine doesn't really affect him, but too much of it will seriously fuck with your system."

Krycek looks at Duce, realizing how seriously she is taking what he'd said. He nods very slowly, not thinking it's particularly psychopathic, just more devoted than he expected. "I wasn't planning on dying. I've done that once already."

Bringing up the caffeine point, he considers it a moment, cocking his head thoughtfully. "It's possible. I tend to drink it whenever he hands me a cup. And my caffeine tolerance is probably not as much as I keep thinking it should be."

Duce's hand runs under her glasses, rubbing her verymuchclosed eyelids wearily. Her words are quiet, muffled by the wrist in front of her mouth, "Good. It's bad enough watching our friends die in our dreams. None of them are allowed to do it in the waking world. Couldn't handle that. Don't wanna sleep anymore. Couldn't deal if we didn't wanna be awake either."

Readjusting her glasses, she slouches back against the chair. "Maybe try cutting down on it? It's a stacking stimulant and can stay in your system a long time. You're also in a teenage body, which probably doesn't have the same tolerance as an adult."

She sticks her tongue out at Jake, who misses the gesture completely. "Unless you're a bloody mutant who lives on the stuff." Realizing what term of endearment she just used to describe Jake, she smacks herself in the forehead with the heel of her hand. "D'oh. We didn't mean.. gah. Well, at least that adjective is true," she says ruefully.

Krycek frowns at the description of her dreams, but files the reference for later. He finds himself nodding again, agreeing with her assessment of the possible caffeine problem. Sighing softly, he shakes his head. "I'll just have to lower my intake. Hope I can avoid the headaches at this point though; that's all I need is to be wanting coffee with Jake drinking it right in front of me all the time." The possibility of asking Jake to maybe not drink so much as well doesn't even really occur to him - or if it does, the idea is just laughable enough for him to dismiss it right off.

He grins at her slip, glancing at Jake once more. "It is. You know, he hasn't told me much about his world... Just that mutants are hated much like any other small group of people supposedly impinging on the boundaries of others." He gives her a wry look. "Humans are exactly the same no matter what universe you're in, I suppose."

Duce, likewise, doesn't even try to imagine Jake without coffee. It would upset her sense of cosmic balance. Or something.

She watches Jake for a moment, her face going first soft with affection and then hard with an almost inhuman anger. It's almost immediately controlled, fleeting, but there long enough for it to register. She rubs her face again, dropping her voice so low that if he weren't sitting right next to her, it wouldn't be loud enough to hear, "It's hard to imagine how anyone could hate him. It.. makes me angry to think someone might want to hurt him, for something he can't help. Alex," she turns her face to his, but her voice is, if anything, quieter, "does he realize that in this world, he's got that same kind of risk coming at him for an entirely different reason? You said he can't be hurt easily, physically.. but.. emotions are a lot easier to damage."

Remembering the expression Jake had when he spoke of the "Friends of Humanity", he nods, expression dark in a way that made it plain he didn't approve of anyone judging Jake for what he couldn't change. "I'm not sure. This world isn't even mine, I don't think. I know where I come from, he'd likely be captured by any of several interested parties for various reasons, none of them beneficial to him." He doesn't look over this time though, not sure if he could keep the disquieting worry from his eyes and at least trusting Duce to understand. "As I said, humans are the same wherever you go. Afraid of what they don't understand, even when they're family."

"Here, too. If they knew about him." Duce shakes her head slightly, correcting her previous statement, "We meant..because he's your boyfriend. While he's not at physical risk, is he aware.. are you aware.. of the kinds of idiocy that might be hurled at him? At you?" She tilts her hand palm-up, fingers slightly cupped, "We ask because we're honestly not sure he has any clue. He's so cavalier about everything. And.. we know he's a catty enough bitch to take any nasty words hurled at him, but it will cut him, Alex, to hear those same things said about you. Especially if he doesn't know they might be."

"Humans are indeed humans," Duce notes, "and some days, that's what frightens us most. In this world, he's more at risk of having someone gaybash him than having the CIA hunting him down to be the guest of honor at a black-ops banquet. Our technology just isn't good enough to identify him if he doesn't make himself obvious."

She doesn't sound as if either thought pleases her in the slightest. Her tone is calm, quiet, and holds the promise of prolonged, painful death to anyone who brings pain to her friends.

"Ah. That." Krycek has so far taken for granted the over-all tolerant atmosphere of Fandom, allowing himself to not worry about the particular ramifications of his and Jake's relationship. It's the first time in his life he hasn't needed to. "He is pretty blase about it. I'm not sure how it's seen where he comes from, to tell you the truth. His father took it much better than I expected him to."

Looking down at his hands, which he's absently cupped together, not quite wringing but not far off either, he sighs. "I'm not sure where exactly this is going. You realize that once we graduate, we head back home - even if I shouldn't--" He stops, realizing that he'd rather not say certain things where he knows they'll be recorded, even if he trusts Spider. "...I don't know if it'll be an issue."

Duce reaches out absently, covering his hands with one of hers. Well, trying. Her hands are tiny. "You know you're not going to get .. kicked out of this world, right? We don't think they could make you leave, if you wanted to stay. Although," she frowns slightly, "we're not sure if you'd be allowed onto the mainland." Her hands squeeze his lightly, "Didn't you say he'd taken you to his world once? If he wouldn't fit into your world.. would you be able to adapt to his?"

The distress Krycek's displaying - the fact that he's displaying it at all, gives her a pretty good indication how much that thought upsets him. The fact that he said he didn't know 'where exactly this is going' and immediately followed it up by something at least three years in the future, indicates to Duce at least, that somewhere in his head, he's expecting it to go forward pretty darn far. "You have options, right now. By graduation, there will probably be more options."

An odd expression crosses her face, and she frowns with sudden worry, "What you said about clone body.. Do you get to go back with it?" Her hand clasps on his, a sudden, almost painful spasm, "You do get to.. go back, right?"

Her words are sort of a whirl and he doesn't know exactly how or what to answer first. Krycek finally sighs, shrugging a little bit. "I don't... I have no idea how I got to be here. It seems like it's my body. But I have no idea." He looks worried for a moment, then shakes it off, returning to a studied sort of calm. "I just woke up here, first day of classes." He smirks. "It was pretty disorienting."

Duce listens, and something in her expression changes. It hardens, becoming ageless, implacable, and calculating. She nods once, almost to herself, and stares at the wall just over Alex's shoulder. The expression lasts barely a minute, before returning to a calm sort of normal. "Right then. You're alive now, and we can think of several people who will fight tooth and claw to keep you in that status. We deal with the future as it comes." And under her breath, she mutters, "And gods help it, because it will need divine intervention."

Journalism Class - Tuesday November 1

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