oo2. partially open.

[xerampelinae]

CHARACTERS: Charles Xavier + Natasi (Caprica Six) + Peter Parker; and others as they happen.
LOCATION: To be added.
WARNINGS: To be added also.
SUMMARY: Only one of these people is getting anything done, turns out.
NOTES: Monthly catch all! This is only partially open because I'm not providing a fixed narrative thing to reply to. Hence, please let me know if you'd like to do anything, and I'll be happy to set up a thread (unless you feel ambitious).

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[borndying]

It happens slowly, in contrast to the speed with which Peter moves when he decides to. He feels it in his gut, first; the sick clench of realization. The rising heat on his face, his neck, the tension that pulls his shoulders in. His hands, shaking, slamming down on the railing harder than he realizes they're going to - white-knuckled and clutching, holding himself up as the sheer force of his own rage threatens to pull him apart from the inside out. He feels like he's going to be sick, right here, right over this fucking railing into whatever engineering bullshit lies below, too shadowy to be properly made out. Maybe there's a person down there who doesn't know what all the fucking fuss is about because people do this kind of stupid shit all the time, here! This is just normal, here, they didn't need Oscorp to shit all over their shitty little lives to create havoc and lizard people and it is so fucking personal he can't see straight.

He really is going to feel bad, later, about breaking Peter's dad's glasses between his hand and the railing. He's going to be angry about that feeling, but he'll have it, eventually. For now, though, he doesn't even realize he's done it.

[adhesion]

WHEEEEEEEE.

Peter isn't planning on staying out here for long -- just a few seconds, to enjoy it -- but he isn't immune, though, to the noise of Harry's hands slamming into railing. Splintering.

A third thread of biocable tugs him back over, cutting off enough to land heavy (and a little out of practice) some several feet away. He's already concerned, like maybe something's wrong, medically, like maybe it was a bad idea, maybe he--

"Harry?"

His gaze drops towards where crushed plastic and glass is smashed between hand and railing, concern derailed with confusion and that pang of oh over his stupid glasses getting broken. By accident. Or. What. He steps nearer.

[borndying]

Probably something is wrong, medically, but that's not actually anything new or interesting. What is new and interesting is that when Peter holds still for long enough, Harry swings at him, almost blindly - his eyes are wet and his face is twisted with grief and rage, and while he's actually surprisingly competent when it comes to this sort of thing (long story, mouthy short guy and some topless models, an anecdote for another day), that's on a day when he hasn't been self-medicating with copious amounts of alcohol and prescription magic for weeks, months on end. He doesn't come within a foot of actually hitting Peter before the sheer force with which he'd flung himself causes him to overbalance, falling hard against the railing and staying there, winded, angry.

Low, "You son of a bitch."

He hasn't noticed he's actually still clutching what's left of Dr Parker's glasses in the same hand he just tried to put in Peter's face.

[adhesion]

Anger, on Peter's end, doesn't even factor into it -- never mind he's now getting punched at, or that those glasses are broken, short-circuiting on these things completely in shock of Harry's reaction. The punch barely has to be avoided, and it's almost ignored completely in the way he kind of follows Harry's slump down onto the railing, hands at a hover.

Not touching, but definitely making sure he doesn't completely swoon, over the edge or not.

"Harry, talk to me?" has a slight plea in it. "Buddy, I don't know what's going on, okay, tell me what's wrong. I know it's-- I didn't think you'd be mad, not like. Really mad."

[borndying]

It's supposed to be a laugh - a mocking laugh, yes, but a laugh. The sound that comes out of Harry in its place is something wounded and ugly, and not that lovely kind of artistic sadness, glassy tears and consumption, it's just. Awful. Messy, blotchy, awful. There is no dignity in this kind of unhappiness, this kind of completely unreasonable response to something that actually isn't a betrayal, Harry, even if Peter did remember the conversation that has so infuriated you.

Peter is a much better friend than Harry deserves, or is even capable of actually having. It's even odds on whether or not he'll ever understand that, no matter how long he languishes undying on this miserable ship.

"Spider-man says no? Oh, I don't really know Spider-man, I can't help you--"

--but it's definitely not happening in the next few moments, while he rants incoherently about things that haven't happened yet for one of them.

[adhesion]

Most days, Peter barely even remembers their time disparity. It doesn't come up a lot, or even ever, and he's always been used to Harry being older than him -- literally, by a couple years, and figuratively, in affect and worldliness and the bite to his humour. Even as children, this was the case.

But he remembers it now, and there's a stricken, gaping silence to him as he catches the coherence detectable in tearful ranting. What it implies.

Details, context, these things escape him. But he knows he must have lied. He must have lied and it must have been important. He's not sure what to say, a hand up to drag fingertips over his own mouth. He'd never imagine even in a million years ever seeing Harry Osborn lose it like this, and it's his own fault.

"Whatever-- happened, I'm sorry, I didn't know."

[borndying]

Some desperate part of him thinks if I just hadn't come-- because obviously then Peter wouldn't have told him, like, ever, if he couldn't tell him today, and then he wouldn't have to know, and this would never happen, and it could just be. Fine.

That is how approximately nothing in the world works. Harry shoves the glasses somewhere at the vague vicinity of Peter's chest, after trying to wipe his face and discovering they were still there. He hasn't quite worked his way back up to objecting to how close to him Peter is, but it's probably coming. Spider-man doesn't give people hope. Peter took hope away from him. Peter with his kindness that has to be a lie, now, because it was all a lie and Harry is still crying with the full-body force of a newborn to whom literally every discomfort is the actual worst thing in the world.

It isn't the sort of thing people are supposed to witness other people doing.

"I'm gonna die and it's gonna be your fault."

and the worst part is how quiet he says it, how utterly sure of it he is.

[adhesion]

Peter's hands reflexively gather the broken glasses where they're pushed at him, dropping his gaze to look down at them. They're ruined, in the way precious things are -- maybe the hinge can be fixed, the lenses replaced, but then they wouldn't be his dad's glasses anymore. And he feels upset about that, small as it is in comparison to someone dying, and he can feel it rising in his chest, but.

That's the nice thing about being around someone who is crying like a child. It kind of forces you not to come close to the same.

"No, Harry," he says. Renewed conviction. "No way, I wouldn't do that, okay. I'm not gonna do that." He remembers that Harry has been drinking, too, forces himself to remember that. "We should go back to level one, I think, and. Talk about it."

[borndying]

Harry has been drinking a great deal, and solidly, since he first arrived on the ship. So much of this now is what that had been intended to dull down to something close to numb - it clearly hasn't worked, but that just means he should definitely drink more rather than less. Sooner or later he has to reach that point where he just doesn't care any more. He thought he was there. He really isn't.

He feels so incredibly stupid right now, it's sickening.

"I'm gonna die," he repeats, like he's marveling at it, like he's just realized. Like it's just now hitting him, properly - his father spent his entire life trying to cheat this disease and he died mutated and bitter, surrounded by people who were paid to be there, a category that Harry doesn't really exclude himself from.

He shoves his face in his elbow and doesn't respond, because. Reasons.

[adhesion]

Peter has half a mind to call Gwen, at this point.

Instead, he backs off a little, crouching down with an arm slung around railing rung. He remembers the early days, after Uncle Ben died, how he and Aunt May retreated into their respective rooms so much; catching her wiping her face at the kitchen sink upon hearing his bedroom door open and close, or her stern-faced judgement when he came through the door past midnight on a school day. He's not wholly sure what he should be doing, here.

Leaving, maybe. He should leave. Retreat into the rafters and make sure Harry gets out of here safely. There's the sound of him standing, of shifting to the other side of the platform, debating it.

[borndying]

"I'm gonna go," Harry says, abruptly, taking his sunglasses off - finally - to wipe at his eyes, redrimmed now but bloodshot in a way that doesn't seem as recent. "I'm - I'm gonna go."

Literally anywhere else.

[adhesion]

There's no reply.

There's also no sound or evidence of Peter even leaving. Obviously he has, silently, because the next time Harry scopes out his own periphery, he's alone on the platform.