tushanshu | seven : a scary conversation [AUDIO]

[Hayley sighs a little, then sounds mostly disappointed. Those paying close attention can probably tell it masks a level of anger.]

Seriously? Is no one talking about the whole people getting murdered thing?

[ooc: Action for Superman is in first thread]

[100% Trek encrypted to: Clark]
[There's the longest pause before she speaks, extremely quiet and definitely scared.]

So I, uh.. was dead.

[100% Trek encrypted to: Lois]
[Her voice is mostly level when she messages Lois, but clearly hiding something less neutral.]

I know you and Clark tell each other everything, so whatever. I need some time off from the radio.

[100% Trek encrypted to: Bruce Banner]
You need to see something. Can you come over later?

[100% Trek encrypted to: Dick Grayson (comics)]
You know, you never actually told me who your family members are.

[100% Trek encrypted to: Jason Todd]
Tell me you're not too busy for a drink.

[100% Trek encrypted to: Maxwell Lord]
[There's a pause, then Hayley sounds more pleasant.]
Hey.

[100% Trek encrypted to: Chekov]
Will you help teach me how to encrypt things? I want to learn.

[100% Trek encrypted to: Loki]
What makes a soul any different from just like, memories and neurons and whatever?

[100% Trek encrypted to: Jor-El] - (added a short while later)
You have all the same powers Superman does, right?

[100% Trek encrypted to: Bruce Wayne] - (added a short while later)
I'm sorry, about work. I just need a few more days off and then I'll come back. Please?

[Assume she hasn't shown up the last week or so.]

[100% Trek encrypted to: Sabriel] - (added a short while later)
I want to learn magic.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[He's not taking it personally, in any case. He's pushed people away enough to know that it has nothing to do with them and everything to do with him-- or in this case, with her.

The honest answer is that no, he doesn't know. But Bruce hasn't made this conclusion lightly. Far from it. So he lays out his reasoning as if it were an experiment whose method he's recounting, letting her draw her own conclusion or argue against his hypothesis.]

The evidence isn't consistent. The... first time it happened, the very first time, he hurt someone I care about. But he didn't kill her. And I think-- I've wondered, recently, if he wasn't as confused at what was happening as I was.

[Moving on quickly,] The next time he saw her, the next two times, he saved her life. She said he was-- almost kind to her. In my future, he saves Tony's life. He's made a friend here. [Bruce isn't sanguine about the Hulk's relationship with the Archive, but he accepts it.]

He's as terrible as I told you he is. He's killed, destroyed countless lives. But it's... not always. So no, I don't know for sure. You'd have to ask him. We don't consult.

[Hayley thinks on it for a moment.] The woman in the lab and your best friend. Those are pretty substantial relationships.

[Meaning that their relationship is not. They're not friends and Hayley certainly isn't any kind of peace for Bruce. Besides, Jeff could be nice too. So could her father. That didn't make them any less of monsters.]

Every monster has a public face. You know that. But sure, maybe I'll ask him myself sometime.

[She's right about this, too, but Bruce doesn't know how to say what he's thinking without delving deeper into a subject he has no intention of going. He thinks the Hulk won't attack her because she's young, female, and someone Bruce explicitly thinks of as someone that needs protection from abusers.

The way he'd always thought of his mother, of Betty, needing protection. It's not that he liked Hayley all that much-- not that he trusted her, not that he was that intent on helping her. But he couldn't let himself be the kind of person that would ignore her, and there's a faint, strangely certain suspicion that the Hulk would feel the same way.]

A public face? [Bruce has to laugh a little, incredulously.] He's... everything I'm not. There's no facade. Nothing faked. It's all-- raw.

You'll know exactly what he thinks about you when he looks at you.

Whatever.

[She doesn't really believe that the Hulk can't have its own public face, but she isn't about to enter a fight right now. Not about that. Bruce is completely biased and she'll never know until she faces the monster herself. But that won't be for some time.]

I'll talk to you later, okay?

[Bruce honestly hopes she never has to find out for herself what the Hulk is like. Bruce is incredibly biased, but not in the way she thinks.]

Keep safe, [he says seriously, letting her go the moment she wants to go.]

seven : a scary conversation [AUDIO]

video 100% Trek encryption

video 100% Trek encryption

video 100% Trek encryption

video 100% Trek encryption

video 100% Trek encryption