hyperactive | ic contact || deerington.

i mean, i barely handled it if we're being honest.
and i like passed out for idk
15 solid hours after everything was done?
which i've also never really had to do before.
like don't get me wrong, i definitely get tired after pushing myself a little too hard, but this was like
i went down like a bag of bricks the second i was sure jean was fine and that my arm was mostly okay.
but this is good to know. remember this when i inevitably turn up on your doorstep needing some help after having done something stupid
or at least needing a solid place to crash while i recover.

anyway. way more importantly:
you had an experience?
well, tell me more.

Oh my god, okay, you can't just say things like that after I've made the active decision to try and give you some space.
I'm this close to choking you out for not coming to me. You should've come to me.
I could've fixed it. I fix everything, dude, that's what I do. I'm the fixer. And the planner. I plan ways to fix things. And then I execute those plans! Flawlessly! Every time!
I would have helped you.

[ somehow. he doesn't know how, but - but he would've. would've been there with billy while he was blacked out in the dirt, at least. billy promises to show up on his doorstep one day and stiles doesn't believe him, frankly, because he knows what self-sacrificing heroic pieces of shit are like, but. fine. it's fine. hopefully billy will never get that hurt again. hopefully it's a non-issue. ]

God. Anyway. Um.
I don't really know how to tell you more. It's all wrapped up in secrets that aren't mine to share. Hold on.

[ there's - a few seconds of deliberation in his head before he slowly commits to what he thinks is a decent explanation of things while maintaining a certain level of anonymity for his friends. ]

So - there are some slightly, uh... supernatural elements at play in the California I came from.
There's this - substance? It's a powder. It's, uh. A derivative of a plant. It's a plant in powdered form. Kind of.
It has some properties? Supernatural properties. As previously made obvious by my talking about California harboring... supernatural... elements. Uh.
This dude, who is like - uh - woodland Obi-Wan? Only, like, with a less active role in anything significant? He gave me some of that powder so I could do a thing, and he was like.
"Only you can do this vaguely described thing that's being awkwardly censored for the sake of protecting the privacy of people who Billy doesn't even know, Stiles," and I was like, woah, okay, cool.
And I had to do that thing... with that powder... and I had to believe that I could do it in order to make the powder work, which in turn would make the thing happen.
And there was this whole thing about how my power of belief can - kickstart things into happening. Fake Obi-Wan called me a spark. Something that can ignite... things. Metaphorically. Spiritaully? Contextually. Not physically. I think. Maybe?
I don't know. I went home and tried to bend a spoon with my mind for a solid three days and it didn't so much as tremble, so.
I'm pretty sure it was just the weird magic powder having a weird magical fluke.

[ give him some space??? billy squints a little, mostly out of confusion, but he's easily distracted by the impossible logistics of what stiles is chiding him over, so fortunately he doesn't question the whole space thing. ]

stiles.
i was passed out. sleeping.
how was i supposed to come to you while i was sleeping?

[ he even goes as far as typing something out about how between the two of them, he's not the one that sleepwalks, but upon review that seems like a really shitty thing to say even if he means no harm, so he deletes all of that. ]

but jeez, i'll text you next time something like that happens, alright?
or i'll try my best to, anyway.

[ that's enough of that though because billy is... very intrigued by all this supernatural talk, even if all of the censoring leaves him feeling a little bit lost. he tries his best to keep up, and by the end of stiles' explanation, billy has reached a very clear conclusion. ]

so what you're saying is that you were given a task that only you could carry out for mysterious reasons that are none of my business, and in order to do this task you had to believe you could do it otherwise it wouldn't work - and you did exactly that.

and you think it was a fluke?
stiles, this sounds pretty similar to what i do.
when i cast spells, if i don't really believe in what i'm doing or i don't actually want whatever thing i'm trying to do to happen - it doesn't really work.
sometimes it does, but not anywhere near as well as it should.
but what i'm saying is that if you've got some kind of
if you're a 'spark' like this guy says you are, and part of that relies on the power of belief
having the attitude that it was just a fluke and it couldn't have possibly been you definitely isn't going to get that spoon to bend.

[ this is less "chiding" and more "dramatic worrying", but given that stiles' worrying tends to circle the drain of snapping or aggressive exhaustion, there's no real logistical difference. billy says he was passed out and stiles is about to launch into a dozen different things he could have done - called stiles before meeting jean, called stiles when he found out how bad jean's injury was, called stiles when he made the decision to try to heal jean's injury, called stiles when the injury first hit him, called stiles when he woke up, told jean to call stiles when he felt like he was going to pass out - but whatever, it's not important. again: billy doesn't owe him anything like this.

he's grateful enough for that "try my best to" and just - pushes on. ]

I mean, again, the magical, mystical powder was magical and mystical on its own. I don't think the - impossible, magical thing that happened was because of me, exactly, I just think the - latent, magical properties of the super magical powder needed a little kick in its engine to get revving?
Like.
From what I can tell, you make things happen through the power of... just... being you.
I made one thing happen with a fistful of magical, druidic training wheels strapped onto my wish-making muscles. I wasn't really riding that bike.
Also, Deaton - Obi-Wan - is kind of a liar sometimes? Pretty big on lying, actually.
"Only you can do this, Stiles" could have very easily just been Deaton for "I need to put pressure on you to do this because you're clearly not self-confident enough to charge up these magic batteries on your own". Or, like, "Literally anybody can do this, actually, but you're the only one available". So.
Yeah.
I've thought this through. A lot. Seriously.
Trust me, there's nothing I'd love more than to discover some amazing, untapped power within me, but. Again - at my best when I'm hopped up on the ol' dew charging my way through Azeroth.

But, uh. The reason I asked about this in the first place was just - maybe you've got some secret trick up your sleeve to help us figure out whether or not the lembas is safe.
I don't really want to risk you using your powers when you don't have to, though. Not while they're playing up.

[ does it really count as 'meeting jean' when billy had been in the middle of playing rayman on top of his dryer waiting for his laundry to finish tumbling when jean quite literally stumbled onto his doorstep, bleeding everywhere and asking for a first aid kit like a bandaid and some neosporin was going to be enough to fix her problem? it's not like he got a whole lot of warning - for any of it, really. jean showing up, his arm basically tearing itself open, nearly blacking out, actually blacking out.

life comes at you fast, stiles. ]

why couldn't he just do the thing then?
why did he have to give it to you?
and what would he gain out of lying to you?
if it was just as simple as doing the thing with the powdery stuff, then he could have just been like "here, do this thing real quick, thanks" and left it at that.
but it's magical, right? you said it needed some kind of kick otherwise it wouldn't do what it needed to do.
so why does that kick not count just because you only did it once?
you did it. it counts. and you could probably do it again if you'd stop trying to discredit yourself.

back when i was first figuring out my magic, i would read a lot of like.
self-help books that uh
that teddy's mom gave me. for other reasons i guess?
which sounds kinda weird in hindsight i guess, but they really helped me kind of
build some self-confidence. positive affirmations, speaking the things i want to do or to be into existence (sans magic), etc.
don't think i won't go down to the library and check out a bunch of them for you too.

i don't know if i can figure out if the lembas is safe, but i could probably make it safe, if it's not already.
it wouldn't take anywhere near as much effort or energy as healing an injury, so it should be fine?
worse case scenario, i accidentally reverse the effects and we just get super hungry afterwards and we order a bunch of takeout.
or, well. one of us gets super hungry, anyway. we probably both shouldn't try it at the same time, just in case.

[ he's not going to dignify this logical rationalization with a response. he's going to worry about billy getting hurt and wishing he was there to help him and there's nothing anyone can do to stop that. suck his dick. ]

I'm not trying to discredit myself, jeez.

[ he's trying to explain how, exactly, he's already discredited himself. big difference. stiles-- isn't going to dig his heels in on this, though. it's not that he's so down on himself that he doesn't think there's some small glimmer of possibility that maybe he did have a hand in stretching the mountain ash the way he did - the feeling of pride and accomplishment he felt when he closed the circle came entirely from within - but man, it's just been hard. it's been a year since then. he's tried a thousand different little things to recapture that feeling, but none of it ever worked. all those disappointments just add up after a while.

but billy believes in him, and he talks about how he gained belief in himself, and it's - sweet. he's not sure what he can say about teddy's mom that won't sound weird, but he thinks she's sweet, too. ]

I wish I'd met you sooner. I would've helped you bump those confidence levels up, dude.
You're one of the best people I've ever met. Smart and attentive and kind and funny. It sucks to think there was even a minute in your life where you didn't know that about yourself.

We're both gonna eat the bread, though.
I'm not gonna let you eat it alone. You're probably not going to let me eat it alone. Start thinking of take-out orders now.
Oh - uh. One more thing?
I got a card in my bag. The note made it sound like they're - personalized?
What'd you get? It's gotta be different from mine.

Edited 2020-04-30 12:58 (UTC)

[ despite how much billy talks up being confident in oneself, he's - kind of a little bit of a hypocrite. while he's much better than he used to be when it comes to believing in himself, he still has plenty of issues with his own confidence, his self-esteem, his self-worth. he has his bad days, his bad weeks, his bad months - but things could be way worse. billy's proud of himself for getting himself to where he is, even if sometimes he doesn't feel so great.

but even so, it's still a little jarring to hear stiles say all these positive things about him out of nowhere. billy's never really thought of himself as being the best at anything, much less being the best person someone's ever met, and if he gets a little bit emotional over someone wishing they could have met him sooner (someone like stiles, who is equally smart and funny and attentive, if not twice as much as billy), well. that's just billy. ]

"start thinking of take-out orders"
wow, look at all this faith you don't have in me.
no, but you're right. no way would i let you eat it by yourself.

oh yeah, i almost forgot about the card.
i kind of thought maybe it was just a joke because mine is the magician?
kind of cliche, honestly. not very creative.
but i don't really know that much about tarot anyway.
what'd you get?

[ stiles knows billy has his moments of insecurity - he saw how low he got after meeting teddy's fireflies, back when the two of them were hiding out in his jeep together privately figuring where to go next - but the self-help books clearly had an effect on him, because stiles still sees billy as someone who stands tall more often than not. his confidence is all the more impressive and admirable than stiles already thought it was, now that he knows he had to work to get it. ]

Seven of swords? Man, I didn't even get a major arcana. Suddenly feeling like an afterthought here, Ramona.
Hold on...

[ he fishes around in his bag until he finds his card, then snaps a couple of quick photos and attaches them to the conversation. ]

I have a vague understanding of what the magician means - it's all about power, untapped potential, things like that. Which suits you, I think?
Even putting aside the whole literally able to reconstruct reality business you've got going on, you just trike me as someone destined to do good things in the world.
I never learned what the minor arcana meant, though. I played Persona 3, like, right when I was getting into WoW, so I didn't dive as deep into tarot as I would have if that obsession wasn't killed before it got a chance to really bloom. That hyperfixation didn't stand a chance against the monolith of lore I found in the Alliance.
I should poke around, I guess. Find someone who might be able to interpret it for me.
Ugh, I don't wanna do that, though. Sharing information around here feels like such a bad idea.
They're going to do a plot twist and lift the curtain to reveal that all Sevens of Swordseseses need to be ritualistically sacrificed, or something. I can feel it in me bones, matey.

[ kind of an inappropriate pirate impression at the end there, but it happened, so. nothing he can do now. ]

Edited 2020-04-30 13:36 (UTC)

[ well. this seems entirely unfair. stiles gets a cute little fox on his card and billy gets some kind of - creepy deer demon thing. the cards don't even look like the come from the same deck, which is also kind of weird. hmm. ]

what's the difference between major and minor arcana?
besides being major or minor.
you're not gonna get sacrificed, stiles.
even if it turns out that the cards are like. targets or something, i wouldn't let it happen to you.
you're probably right that it's not a good idea to just go advertising your card to random people though, just in case they give more insight about a person than we realize.
but maybe there's more information on the internet
or the library.
we could kill two birds with one stone
pick up some self-help books and tarot for dummies.

the fox is really cute though.
mine is all
hold on.

[ and then a couple seconds later, billy sends a picture of his card, which is nowhere near as cute as stiles'. it's good artwork, just... kind of ominous in a way billy can't really pinpoint. ]

i guess it's appropriately themed?
for deerington, i mean. not me.

I'm not really sure? Major arcana are the big fancy boys with the pretty faces - magician, lovers, emperor, high priestess, all the A-listers. The minor arcana cards are like, suit cards. Swords, cups, wands. Maybe another one? Totally blanking.
But yeah, they're less individualistic. Three of cups, four of wands. That's literally all the information I've retained here. I don't even know if you use them in actual readings or if they're just there to look pretty.

[ they're probably not just there to look pretty, but again, stiles' deep dive never went down that far. kind of frustrating, at this point. for all his wikipedia reading and all the baseless, pointless trivia he's amassed over the years, of course this is something he doesn't know. why couldn't ramona have sent them an ominous treasure hunt where the clues to find things were, like, behind the scenes movie facts or trivia about bizarre medical history. he'd ace that test.

billy's offer to protect him is very sweet, and he'd love to reply, but his cursor hovers over the card he sends and he nearly jumps out of his skin. what the fuck. ]

Oh, that's a death threat. That's such a death threat.
I'm gonna get stabbed by a little fox sitting on a sword. You're gonna get vivisected for medical science.
We're screwed.
We definitely need to hit the library. In our last few hours on this earth.
... Dream-earth.

okay. stiles.
relax. it's probably not a death threat.
isn't there a death card? i feel like that'd be more of a death threat than a weird deer mage and a fox with a sword collection.
i mean we should definitely still go to the library at some point to see if we can figure out what our cards really mean, but
can we not put vivisection out into the universe, magic-man?
being tortured in the name of medical science isn't exactly my idea of a good time.

[ y'know - been there, done that. ]

The death card means change. Growth. Evolution! Not actually death.
I'd love the death card. Are you kidding me? Dude, give me the death card any day of the week and I'd be happy.
Way less threatening than a predatory animal staring into my soul and hoarding a murder weapon under its murder claws (that it could use for murder).

But okay. You're right. I'm calm. I just want to make a plan.
We'll hit the library, figure this out. The more detailed information we get about our cards, the more likely we are to understand what Ramona meant by them being representative of our roles here. After that, we can... I don't know. Panic with renewed vigor thanks to all the new information I can work into my catastrophizing.

oh.
well. that's kind of misleading, isn't it?

we're not gonna panic. alright?
especially not before we even know what's going on with these cards.
panicking isn't going to help anything until we know exactly what ramona means.

[ ... ]

we should also probably try to figure out who ramona is, too.
and mother superior?
i... assume she's a nun, but i don't know why a nun would like
threaten everyone with famine, if that's what the letter is actually implying.

Your face is kind of misleading.

[ anyway, it's fine. he's not really panicking, he's just - joking about panicking to undermine the fact that this whole situation is pretty nervewracking. he's unsettled, if nothing else, and he's dancing around saying it, but he's apprehensive to find out what his card means. he knows they've got no choice, he knows information is the best weapon he could possibly wield, but - something about that fox just gets under his skin. ]

I mean, you know what evil priests are like. There's a dozen movies and TV shows where hyper-reigious assholes use god as an excuse to commit atrocities.
"Sorry about the famine," she'll say, hoarding all the instant noodles in town for herself. "I'm just Deer God's messenger! This is just Deer God's deer-liverance." Or whatever.

Actually, shit, should we start stocking up on food? Probably not, right?
I feel like all the food is going to go rotten, or something. Become inedible, at least, if the magic water purifier is anything to go by. I don't really want dead food in my house.

deer-liverance is pretty good.
but... i guess you're not wrong. if there was ever a place for evil priests and nuns, i guess this would be it.

we should probably at least grab some non-perishables or something.
canned food, dry pasta.
if it does rot, at least it'll be sealed up and easy to toss out, and if it doesn't
or if like, the supermarket closes up for some reason instead
at least we'll have some stuff to tide us over until we have to break into the lembas.
can dry pasta even rot?

hold on, i'm gonna text logan.

Okay. I'll start stocking up. Maybe you can get a headstart at the library and I'll meet you once I've decimated literally every shelf?
Or - wait.
You're the one with a job. And money. For food. You should probably stock up on supplies. That I'll... then... steal... a portion of. For myself. No big deal.
I'll meet you at the library? Post-Logan texting.

Wait, wait.
Say hi for me.
I need you to say hi for me. And, like, prove that you did it. Screenshot the message.
And his response.

[ there's a short lull in the conversation as billy has a quick back and forth with logan, but he does as requested. ]

okay, yeah.
just text me a list of stuff you want.
logan wants me to pick some stuff up for him too while i'm out so like
don't rush at the library.

[ ... ]

wait, you're the one with a car.
actually, it's fine. i got it.

[ and, as promised. ]

> ATTACHMENT.PNG

He didn't say hi back.

[ which, you know, is mock outrageous. definitely not real ourageous. stiles isn't actually, legitimately mildly annoyed that logan didn't drop everything he was talking about to say hi back to stiles. that would be ridiculous. and not at all hurtful. smh. ]

Dude, just pick up things that look like they'd last. I trust you.
Does Logan know we're not old enough to buy him booze? You should probably tell him that if he asks.

the hi is probably implied.

and i already got that out of the way.
that was the first thing i told him we wouldn't be able to get before he even asked.
i'm kind of on the fence about the cigars tbh but.

anyway. are you allergic to anything?

I just don't know why he couldn't say hi back.
Someone says hi to you. You say hi.
This is, like, basic human interaction 101. It would've taken him two seconds to exhibit a baseline level of consideration.
If I said hi to you, you'd totally say hi back. Because you're nice, and you love me.
Don't get him any cigars.
Tell him Stiles said he's not allowed any cigars. Tell him I'm not buying him any cigars and neither are you.

[ no time for allergy talk. he's dwelling, hi. ]

yeah, but this is logan we're talking about.
he's not exactly your friendly neighborhood spider-man.

i was thinking about accidentally "forgetting" to buy them.
but i'll tell him, hold on.

Edited 2020-05-03 04:09 (UTC)

Make it very clear that this is a punishment.

i thought he was the adult between the three of us.

> ATTACHMENT.PNG

[ there's a bit of a pause here, but it's just because stiles is laughing. this is. cute. billy is endearing, as ever. ]

You're my favorite.
I'm glad we're friends.

i'm screenshotting this too.
for posterity. 💖

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hyperactive - 2020-05-04 17:30 (UTC) - Expand

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