savetheearth | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Who: Julien and OPEN
Where: Pretty much anywhere works, please specify!
When: Idk, any time this week?
What: It passes for normal living.

Julien had a lot to do these days.

Early in the mornings he'd exercise in one of the parks, even during the worst of the cold snap. He wasn't the fastest or strongest around, but his endurance was startling. Sometimes he came back for more in the middle of the afternoon.

Some days he had shifts at the LSR clinic, often at the front desk, out shoveling snow whenever it was there. When he didn't have work he'd meander the city and frequent various places, sometimes in company and sometimes alone. Sometimes he'd find a place to read, sometimes he'd go back to the apartment for that. Now and then he'd ride his scraped-up secondhand motorcycle, anonymous in a helmet, just to be riding it.

Here and there throughout the day he'd stop in a park or somewhere else out of the way, including the odd rooftop, and feed pigeons, which were fearless of him.

By the time it was starting to get dark he'd usually head back to the apartment he shared with Blaine, since he was unable to see in low light. Sometimes instead he'd go to a party and be taken back in someone's car, making his way from there with the help of streetlights.

He was a short young man with a compact build, rarely seen in a shirt without a collar, with fluffy dyed-blue hair and slightly odd-looking blue eyes. Someone who'd known him for a while might notice stress showing around his eyes and the corners of his mouth, but he smiled enough, especially when watched, that usually it was hard to tell.

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Being ignored left Ravi at a loss. He wasn't sure whether the right answer was to keep pushing or to retreat and leave him be. But while he stood there trying to decide, Elly rushed in and took over.

It was a relief, frankly. That took the pressure off of him to know how to handle it, and it was easier to tell her what was wrong than to attempt to console Julien himself. He moved beside her, hovering, still not quite sure what to do but knowing that it would be wrong to just leave.

"He just now spoke with Doctor Strider," he said, a low murmur that Elly could hear but Julien, he hoped, would ignore and fail to process.

When someone grabbed him Julien went rigid, but just for a moment. Right. Elly. Not a threat. He sagged in her arms and let his hands fall from his face, and it was impossible not to notice that he was hot to the touch, as if he had a high fever, but he was completely without sweat.

This was, that distant part said, a point where he should sob, or he should have started already. He couldn't, of course, right now he couldn't even fake it. Would that have helped? Of course not... hah, he'd even known it could happen, it had before, they'd talked about it and he'd cried then, too and that hadn't helped. He should be used to it, why was this even worse?

Ravi said something with Aaron's name in it. Julien sucked in one of his deep steady breaths and managed to keep from moaning like a child. There was something he should be doing instead. There was. He couldn't.

She was sharp enough to infer what had happened, closing her eyes and drawing a deep breath. So they had lost one of theirs.

It wasn't the fact that, while it was obvious he was bothered, he didn't cry that concerned her, but, instead, as he leaned into her, his body temperature. He was burning up. "Julien?"

Her posture stiffening, she looked up at Ravi, something of an alarmed look on her face. "He's burning up."

He half-folded his arms, one hand over his mouth. It was easy to assume that what he'd said had upset Julien further, which made him feel like he shouldn't be here. Elly was so much better at handling this kind of thing, she actually knew what to do...

His eyes darted to her when she voiced that concern. It felt awkward to explain it when Julien was standing right in front of him, but the other option was letting Elly panic about it and forcing Julien to explain it himself when he was already upset. "Ah--He runs hot," he mumbled, almost like he hoped nobody would hear it. "It was a pulse, I think."

He didn't want to do anything right now, he wanted to... collapse, and wait for whatever this was to be over. But no, no. There were people talking over him. He had to...

Julien's legs shifted as if he was going to try to rise, but all he did was sort of rock and slump back. Now he did make a sound, a vaguely parroty deep thready groan, cracked so it was as if two similar voices were almost in synch. It vibrated in his body like his chest in particular was a speaker, resonating from him into Elly. There was nothing human in it, but there were words.

"-god damn it."

A very, very deep breath. His eyes were still streaming and his face was contorted, but Julien's breathing remained steady. His chest moved more than a human's might, like there was a hinge down his sternum that flexed as it went out and in.

When he was truly emotional he couldn't ever really control his voice. "Sorry."

Elly was familiar with the strange anatomy changes, but this one took her aback. Running hot was one thing--she could get used to that--but there were certain things that Julien did that... She didn't let go, but it was surprising, and a bit unnerving initially. She had yet to encounter anyone with significant changes, and the thought that there could be people with varying human/other anatomy was interesting, yet at the same time...

Well, if it came to it, she'd address it the best way she could. She was beginning to get the impression that she may have been over her head when she volunteered for the job, however.

Shaking her head, she tried not to change her posture at all, or let on that she so much as noticed. "It's all right." Elly answered back. "We're your friends, and we'll stay here as long as you need."

Ravi also found himself unsettled whenever Julien did anything particularly alien, and the things his voice did when he wasn't careful about it definitely qualified. He winced, glad that for the moment Julien wasn't paying enough attention to his surroundings to notice the reaction.

He was about to offer to leave until Elly said they'd stay there as long as he needed. WELP. THERE WENT THAT PLAN. Now instead of a conscientious offer, it'd look like callous abandonment. (It wouldn't really have been a conscientious offer anyway.)

"You can talk to us, if that will help," he offered, instead.

He shouldn't... be like this, it was upsetting people. Julien was the one who always had to be strong. Flighty and odd maybe, to a degree, but at core dependable, stable. He swallowed hard and rubbed at his eyes, grimacing in a way that was a little like a smile.

There was barely anything human left about him. Heart and lungs, eyes and ears, skin and muscle and bone, hair, scent, voice, nothing was the same and by now he had to hide it. By now, surely, he was very few pulses away from something that could not be concealed, and it scared him in a way he'd only ever let on to one person.

He wasn't going to let that on now. Swallowing again, Julien tried to get hold of his voice. Grief was like a fist around it. If he kept to a whisper it - sounded abnormal, but not so alarming. "I just... I can't believe it happened again. I'm supposed to be cooler about this. It should be - easier."

His voice changed again, this time a bit more... human, maybe? Certainly less alien, but still off. It was obvious he was trying to put up a strong front as well, and Elly loosened her grip on him slightly, to give Julien a bit more autonomy. She still sat there, arms around him in a hug, but it was less as a reassurance than for stability like before.

She spoke slowly, choosing her words carefully. "I don't think someone forgetting would ever be easy on anyone, whether it's the first time or the fifth." She paused. "You don't always have to be so strong, Julien. Everyone needs a little help sometimes."

Ravi could vouch for that. He still remembered when Alex's cat had forgotten, most likely for good considering how long it had been since. Maybe not quite the same, but it was still distressing to think about, still unsettling to look at him and remember a different sort of him. It wasn't hard to imagine how much more it must hurt for someone Julien felt as close to as Aaron.

It was the 'should' in Julien's words that pinged Ravi for what he felt needed to be said. "There is no right way to feel. However you feel is how you should feel." Lessons from therapy, learned and then regurgitated at the right opportunity.

Neither of them really knew him but they were trying, and that was kind of them. He was... glad, that they both were here. Despite that, Julien felt heavy and distant.

They didn't really know him. And he didn't really know them. There had been so very few people that Julien really, entirely trusted, who he had known would seek him out and try to help if or when the worst happened. Aaron had been the last one, and Julien loved him, no less than he loved his sister. And now, like her, like the others, he was... unavailable. He did not love Julien back. Whatever was going to happen, for the most part Julien would have to try to handle it himself.

-ah. Now Julien's outer eyelids opened and he shuddered, going stiff again at the familiar sensation of a pulse. Someone else's thought intruded. It was flat, and he thought fleetingly that there was anger in it, and despair. For a moment he resisted it, but - really, it was right. People would help him, like today, and that was a good thing, but he could not count on love or loyalty to bind anyone to him. There were many things that he would have to face alone.

Something seemed to settle and cool in him. Again Julien swallowed, and now he reached into a pocket, trying not to jostle Ellie, and wiped his face with a white handkerchief. Blew his nose. With his other hand he clasped her arm - his skin was silk-soft and thin and dry - and he opened his sepia-tinted inner eyelids, looked up at Ravi, and gave him a small, watery smile. His pupils had dilated, wide and vulnerable.

"Thank you," he said, and managed to sound mostly human. "I'm just - upset. I shouldn't have tried to explain everything right away, like that." He blinked and had to wipe his eyes again. "I hate losing people."

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