[Complete] Interim Ep.3: An Unusual Request (Sat. Morning)

[Bannon]

The Bannon Farm was remote, which was probably for the best given it's purpose within the Fellowship.  Jase had seen his dad and Hank off an hour ago - there was a get-together of the Sons this weekend, where they would sit around, grill, drink beers and bitch about the state of the country and the Deep State ruining everything.  Jase wasn't himself given to conspiracy theories, at least ones without some hard evidence to back them, but he wondered if perhaps the militia weren't perhaps close to the truth about nefarious government dealings.  After all, a four-decade long project costing millions of dollars had been going on in Shelly without any oversight for the last twenty years or so, if Cook was telling the truth.  How many other tiny parasitic fiefdoms were out there, self-perpetuating projects that were conveniently forgotten about and shuffled into the paperwork?  How many billions were being siphoned off?

Not that the thought offended him, as such.  In fact part of his significant mind was calculating how he could gain access to, and subsequently control of, the Shelly project's resources.  That was one of the reasons he was considering cooperation with Cook - he and his friends could make use of that level of access and secrecy.  Of course some of them might have moral or ethical qualms, which was bothersome.  Completely exposing Cook would bring the project to an end... Or would it?  After all, he had achieved some success.  Perhaps the powers that be would want to capitalise on that, which in turn presented a new set of opportunities and challenges to overcome.

Of course the Cook situation was not top of his list of priorities, merely a slow-heating base with ingredients yet to be added.

Later today his friends were coming round to hang out and discuss the happenings in Shelly in a more laid-back way than previously.  Cassie's idea of a string board was a good one - one he would remember for other uses.  He didn't need such things himself, but they were brilliant methods for allowing groups to share such data and organise thoughts.  He'd set things up for the afternoon as a host should.  A large slow-cooker was making some venison chili in the kitchen, and plenty of beers and sodas were in the small fridge in the barn's loft.  Right now he was in the smaller barn that served as the farm's garage, standing underneath his Charger and checking the brake and fuel lines as he hummed along with the growling voice of Alice Cooper's "Feed My Frankenstein" as it blared from the stereo on the workbench.  Underneath, because the gleaming black car was currently standing on air roughly two feet above Jason's head as he scrutinised the underside.

It had been a whim, really.  He knew he could move objects more easily than before, and had started to test that with objects in the garage.  First a toolbox, then the trickle charger.  He'd found he could move man-sized objects at roughly average running speed with little difficulty, though using them as weapons would probably be clumsy at best unless the target was standing still.  Finally he'd stood in front of the Charger, considering for a long moment before lifting a hand towards it, gently grasping it with his mental 'hand' and lifting.  It had been harder, but not insurmountably so as the muscle car - all three-thousand-plus pounds of it - had raised into the air steadily.  He had laughed at that, a boyish chuckle that his friends would have been surprised to hear, and dropped his hand to his side.  He didn't really need that Jedi-like gesture, and yet still took reassurance in the physical link - a habit to break, for certain. Excitedly, Jason wondered what his upper limit was - could he lift a Mack truck?  What about a passenger jet - a small one?  Could he even levitate himself? Although.. given the lack of fine control he was leary of trying to actually fly.  At least currently.

For now, though, it was a very convenient tool that opened all manner of possibilities.  And so the lanky teen hummed, whistled and occasionally sang along with the classic rock belting out of his stereo as he called a wrench to his hand and, reaching up, began making a few small adjustments.

[Clara Lys Wright]

"Jase," came Clara's voice from behind him. She'd been standing there quietly for several minutes, but with a car floating on top of him, she hadn't wanted to startle him and cause the crushing death of a friend. She'd waited until he'd moved out from under the pile of metal and rubber before calling out to him. 

She was in decidedly un-Clara like clothing, at least for the person she'd been at school since Jase had moved to Shelly: a grey t-shirt of a rather formless cut, tan-green pants and hiking boots. Her hair was braided back and still damp; he could smell the apricot perfume from her shampoo. She was bereft of all the little adornments she usually wore: earrings, the three rings that held sentimental value to her, the compass necklace Etienne had given her, a stylish bracelet on most days. She looked positively bare leaning up against the door-frame and watching him with curiosity. "Do you have a minute before the get-together today? I'd like to talk to you about something."

[Bannon]

"I have time." he answered calmly, nodding.  "Let me just get my hands cleaned off, or the oil will stick."   Dressed in a sleeveless tee and shapeless fatigue pants over combat boots, his hair the usual 'shown a comb once and left' shaggy style he wore these days, he radiated purposeful calm as he moved to the sink next to the workbench.  Behind him, the car slowly lowered to the ground, touching down gently enough that the suspension did not even need to absorb the shock as he studied Clara with the usual unabashed, unblinking stare he focused on something or someone he found interesting.  Despite her composure, Clara shifted her weight slightly under that pale gleaming appraisal, wondering if he knew the effect it had and did it anyway as some kind of test or game, or whether it was just... Bannon being Bannon.

Or maybe it was both.  God knew that she had a hard enough time figuring out even the easiest, most expressive people in the Fellowship sometimes.  Jason's feline, Sphinx-like mien might as well have been machine code written in Braille.  She wondered briefly what he saw, what he thought when he regarded her so attentively.  Other than that brief talk with him after the role-playing get-together at the pool house, she'd not been alone with him at all - and this Jason was a different creature to the badly-formed paper mask he'd peered out at her from behind that night, showing a glimpse of the intelligence which, in later days, he'd shown no compunctions about displaying.  Now he was studying her as he cleaned off, having not said a word beyond the greeting. 

For his part, Jase was curious.  Clara had not exactly shunned him, but nor had she ever sought him out.  She treated him with the same polite decency she treated most people - other than the Jauntsens, who seemed capable of touching raw nerves in the normally collected girl.  He wondered if there was some special reason, a torment in earlier years similar to those practiced on Sean or Autumn... But his curiousity ended there, more or less.  She was Lona's sister-in-all-but-name, much as he was Sean's 'brother' - though the two girls seemed much closer, probably due to them both being 'normal', at least in that way.  Or perhaps it was a feminine bonding thing?  He wasn't one hundred percent sure either way, and that datum went whirring away into his mind to the mental 'string board' he had for studying interpersonal relationships.

What he was mainly marking, as he washed his hands with grease remover while she stood there, were the differences.  No subtle makeup.  No ornamentation.  Hair still damp and not pristinely styled as usual, and clothes that were downright casual.  Not exercise gear, nor the preppy elegance she usually evinced.  She seemed raw as she stood there, and he filed that away even as his mind stored the sight of her silhouette against the morning sunlight.  Drying off his hands with a rag, he moved to stand in front of her, head tilted to one side as behind him the stereo clicked 'off', leaving them in silence.

"What do you need to talk to me about?" he asked with a trace of curiousity and emphasis on the 'me'.

[Clara Lys Wright]

She shifted, subconsciously leaning towards him just a fraction. "I wanted to ask if you'd be willing to do something for me- with me. Eh," she folded her arms over her middle and shrugged, "I'm not sure which you'd count it as." She waved the moment of confusion away. "Either way. I was hoping you'd help me with something." She glanced over at him, just a hint of a smile on her her lips. 

He motioned her to continue with the drying rag.

"I've been working on martial arts training, the bit I can do by myself and now that school's started I'll have the ROTC classes to help. And whatever we do as a group." She sighed, looking pensive. "But it's not...enough? Not like really being a fight. It feels like pretend and I've been useless when people are getting attacked by monsters. Just standing around like an idiot and more likely to get myself or others hurt worse than do anything helpful. And that's not because I don't know how to throw a punch, it's that I just...seize up. I'm not even quite afraid. My brain just..." She let out an annoyed huff. "Freezes."

She looked away, "I was hoping you could help me with that. You seem like the most level-headed person on our particular merry-go-round. You don't freeze." She shot him a grin before looking away again. "I mean, you freeze things, but you don't hesitate. I-I really admire that about you." She looked at the ground a few feet in front of her, summing up with a touch of melancholy, "I want to help keep everyone safe. Give us a chance to survive instead of being the reason one or all of us don't make it to graduation."

She was quiet for a moment and then started when she realized she hadn't actually told him what she wanted. She stood up straighter and looked directly at him, some of her nervousness at being vulnerable banished in the face of having at least half a plan. "So, I was wondering if you could, I guess, hunt me?" She flushed at the awkward phasing. "I mean, sneak up on me and scare me randomly. Even try to grapple or hit me, to get me used to being startled and afraid and make me more aware of what's going on around me. Like ambush boot camp."

[Bannon]

"You don't feel fear?" he asked with fresh appraisal in his gaze.  She tilted her head.

"Huh? I mean, I've been afraid before, it's just usually after whatever's going on. Like...like there's a time delay. Once I get my head working it's all 'focus on dealing with the issue, fall apart later.' I have to have time to think to really freak out." She shrugged, looking vulnerable so looking anywhere but at him. "There's a reason everyone calls me a frigid bitch, Jase, and it's not just because I'm a virgin."

He made a soft sound that might be amusement, causing her to glance at him briefly, noting the slight smile on his lips and crinkle at the corners of his eyes.

"I won't help you... that way." he said casually, nodding to her to follow him as he exited the garage. "For one thing, with you still learning to use your Shine, that's a good way for one or both of us to end up injured or worse." He glanced over his shoulder at her. "As our powers training progresses, I will start thinking of exercises similar to surprise or ambush so that people can learn to respond properly, rather than dangerously to themselves and each other. From what I understand, that will only solve part of your problem, though."

She followed him out, grimacing in frustration.

"Not likely to be a problem on my end. My 'Shine,' if that's what we're calling it, I mean. The worst I can do is make everyone else cooler and feel when things are weird. I can't do what you or Charlie or even Devin can do. I'm...just basically a scanner and weird battery for the rest of you." Yup. No bitterness there. Not at all. Why do you ask? She watched him from under downcast eyes again as they moved. "That's why I want to be worth something in a fight. Lilly can punch through a tree from the look of it. Charlie...." She shuddered a little, "Charlie's got himself covered. Devin's our spastic little bopper. Lona's the healer. Cora's got her whole weird energy thing. You're all Song of Ice and Fire minus the dragons. Unless Charlie can turn himself into a dragon. Gah. Sara's all bald guy in a chair on us. I don't remember his name. Sean's the world's bustiest hacker. Marissa's a world-class bitch but people like her more than me. Cade's apparently Dr. DooLittle with a shotgun. I'm not sure what's up with Autumn, but I bet it's still actually something she can do instead of just....Shining everyone else?" She sighed again. "I know what I can do is helpful, but when monsters are taking chunks out of your friends, I'd like to do more than just be a basically a weirdness radio." At Jase's eyebrow lift, she clarified, "Scanning and broadcasting. Not much help in a fistfight."

He abruptly turned as he walked, facing her whilst stepping in the same direction towards the farmhouse.

"You mentioned being a virgin." he asked with almost clinical curiousity. "Yet you've been seeing Etienne a while. The two of you have not been intimate?"

She flushed cherry red and looked away from Jase, nearly tripping over a stone in the path. "Only a couple of months," she mumbled.

"More than some need." he replied with a faint smile. "Any reason you haven't done the deed?"

She managed to blush even deeper, staring at Jase's calm questioning with wide eyes. Her frazzled brain finally settled on an acceptable deflection from the tangled truth. "Why do you care? I mean, what does it matter to you?" The words were direct, even harsh, but her inflection was more confusion than attack.

"I'm building a picture." he responded, unfazed by her deflection or her tone. "And your response is part of it. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you probably did want to sleep with him at some point, but froze." He regarded her with that same faint smile, his pale green eyes unflinching. "If you say I am wrong, I will accept that as the truth."

Instead of answering - she knew she sucked at lying - she chucked a small rock at him with a scoop to the ground and then a flick of her wrist. "That's not a question you're supposed to ask, y'know. It's....personal. And just what kind of picture are you trying to build, that involves my pretty much non-existent sex life?" She didn't sound angry yet, but she was certainly off balance.

The rock stopped in mid air as Jase, too came to a stop, still appraising her flushed features.

"The question is pertinent because of the reason your sex life is non-existent.  I believe there is a link between that freezing up and the freezing up you do in dangerous situations."  He stepped towards her again, the rock floating to one side and dropping to the ground as he gazed down at her, smiling a little more warmly.  "It is not because you lack the desire to act - it is because your desire to act conflicts with your thoughts.  You are a structured thinker, a planner par excellence, but your weakness lies in dealing with anything that falls outside the plan you have in mind."  He was close now, smelling as he usually did - faint tobacco smoke, motor oil, a spot of cologne.  She could feel his stare like a sun lamp on her face.

"You are out of touch with your passions, viewing them as inconveniences, disruptions to the Plan, rather than the very engine that drives you.  Plato suggests in Phaedrus that the dark horse, Passion, be yoked alongside the light horse of Reason, because Passion without Reason is chaos, and Reason without Passion is stasis."  Jason's tone was low, even intimate as he explained.  "You need to allow your horses to run together, even if sometimes that makes them harder to rein in.  Consider - Devin was terrified, but did not freeze.  Charlie was terrified - and yet did not freeze.  Cora was scared - and yet did not freeze.  That is because they have what you lack - two horses, running together."

[Clara Lys Wright]

"Well, Papa said there wasn't room on the estate for ponies," Clara deflected again, her breath coming fast at both Jase's invasion of her personal space and the nature of the conversation. "And I don't think Devin ever stops to think about anything. He sold Reason to get Passion a leather trenchcoat." She glanced up at him and quickly away. "And I have passion. I just....everything gets worse when I don't think things through. I hurt people. People hurt me. Passion is an asshole."

"It's dangerous.  And it makes us dangerous.  But asshole is a dismissive word for something so integral.  Without it, we are shadows."  He reached up and gently tugged a stray strand of her dark hair behind an ear.  "Wanting things, desire - whether to help or harm, possess or destroy - that's what makes us powerful.  At least..." he added with a sly smile, grazing his thumb across her cheek as he lowered his hand once more.  "It is where I find my power."

She just stared at him for a moment, her brain short-stopped by a touch and teenage hormones. "I, uh," she closed her eyes to clear her head and put some of her composure back together. What does he mean by that? "I do want to help," she said, swallowing over her churn of thoughts and emotions and trying to get the conversation emotionally back on track. 

She cleared her throat,"So, how do I do that? I thought the whole jump-scare thing would work, but I don't really trust anyone to do it and you don't want to, so...?" She held out her arms in defeat. An impish thought in Lona's voice occurred to her, one that colored her cheeks again. "And if you say 'get laid'," she warned, "I'm going to throw another rock at you. A whole bunch so you can't stop all of them."

He grinned at her, his own composure enviably solid, though the warm gleam in his eye, the copper flecks catching the sun, made her think of firelight dancing...

"Mmm, I wouldn't suggest something so bold... at least not yet." he said with a teasing crook to his smile.  "But if you treat me to dinner, you might get lucky."  He smiled as her blush deepened, then impulse grabbed him and, true to his own philosophy, he decided to see where it led, dipping his head down and gently pressing his lips to hers.  It was plain he had never kissed before, it being a fairly chaste first kiss, but it was warm and slightly insistent, a single point of contact between the two despite how close they were standing.

Clara stumbled back in shock. Lona's gonna kill me. Her more immature impulses whined back, I didn't do anything. The lightning fast reply: You didn't mind it, at all. "Jase, I-I have a boyfriend," she said her voice unsteady. "I know the rest of you hate him and...and...he....we...." She was gulping for air, her body shaking. She seemed on the verge of collapsing, which wasn't quite the reaction he expected from the kiss.

He blinked once, then focused on her face, his eyes narrowing a little at the mention of Etienne but otherwise giving no sign that the mention of the treacherous mercenary had affected him at all.  The kiss for him had been pleasant, warming, and he'd felt the start of her yielding to it before she stumbled away.  But even as he controlled his disappointment, he focused on the matter at hand.

"What do you feel?" his voice rapped out, the tone severe.  "Breathe, and answer without thinking.  Quickly!"

She looked up at him, the rapid-fire of his words only making her anxiety worse. Her hands clenched tightly and unclenched, over and over, small divets forming in her palms where her nails pressed. She pushed, forcing words out through a jaw that mostly refused to open. "Scared! Confused! Hurt!" 

Her muscles seemed to all let loose at once and she did stumble down onto the ground, her hands grabbing at the sides of her head. Words rushed out in a heated cry, now. "Why can't people just be who they say they are? Why can't the world make sense? Why does everyone lie and, and change everything and make it insane?" Tears streaked down her face and her voice dropped to nearly a whisper, her eyes staring intently at nothing. "Why does everyone leave me in the end? Why does everything fall apart?"

[Bannon]

He stood for a moment, absorbing her words, dispassionately studying her as she sat on the ground crying. Then he nodded slowly, unseen by her, as pieces fell into place in his mind before he slowly knelt in front of her. Gently, he reached out and took her hands from the side of her head, holding them carefully.

"People are afraid to be who they really are. Even I was reluctant, until the night of the party. Everyone wears a mask - sometimes necessary, sometimes not." he said in a soft, calm tone. "You cannot control that. Any more than you can control people lying, or force objective meaning on the world, or prevent change. Flowers bloom, flowers die - and that is why they are beautiful. Fire fascinates and warms, or fire destroys and terrifies. And that is why it is so compelling, Clara. That is life." He moved to sit alongside her, feeling her through the connection of their hands. "And it hurts even me."

He sighed and wrapped one arm around the girl's shoulders. "For what it is worth, I will not lie to you. I despise lies, generally." he remarked, still holding one of her hands in his as he hugged her. She practically collapsed against him, her muscles now trembling with exhaustion instead of stress.

"Life is stupid," she finally croaked grumpily. She took several more deep breaths, trying to calm her tremors and figure out some semblance of emotional control. She had some of her anxiety meds in her car, but taking them meant she'd sleep through the afternoon and there were plans for the day. "And thanks. For-for not lying. Unless you are. I clearly can't tell when someone is."

"That too is a function of instinct. Though admittedly, you were targeted." Jase said calmly, but there was a hint of something icy underlying his tone. "Lonely people are easy prey." His arm around her gave her a little squeeze.

"Personally, I find outright lies distasteful. Which is why I don't do it." he glanced at the top of her head on his shoulder. "Now... Examination and reflection. You said you were scared, confused and hurt. Scared of what, in that moment? Confused by what, in that moment? Hurt by what, in that moment? Don't shut those feelings away or cover them up. Examine them."

She stiffened and started to pull away from him, her survival technique of avoidance in full swing. He could feel her wrestle control of it, her mind and will now turned towards a stronger skill: analysis. "That was a panic attack," she told him quietly but matter-of-factly. "They make your head and body basically overdose on fear and stress. Or at least that's how it is for me. So, that's part of it. But what I meant, beyond adrenaline, was...." Her eyes scanned across the abandoned fields of the farm as she fell silent in thought.

 "I told Etienne, the night of the party, that I hate change. I make a plan, I account for everything I can think of, and I stick to it so nothing can...can...." She sighed, her breath a steady stream from her lips and she searched for the right words. "Every time something changes in my life, something major, it means I'm getting pushed aside again. Ignored, forgotten. Trampled over, if I'm in the way. So, if I have a plan, if I'm in control of what's going on, that can't happen." She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped an arm around them. "That's the theory, anyways. So far this year it hasn't worked at all. 'Course I never really had a 'what to do in case of monsters, psychic powers, and government conspiracies' contingency. Zombies, yes. But I just cribbed those from the CDC."

"Hmph." The sound was an amused grunt at the mention of zombies. "Everyone cribs those from the CDC." Jase grinned a little. "Go on, though."

She gave him a timid smile at that, then turned back to her thoughts to answer his questions. "So. Yeah. I'm scared because every time things go off track my life gets turned upside down and I have to spend years setting it right or figuring out how to deal with it. Confused." She made a rude sound and he could feel her tense again, her hand tightening in his. "People confuse me. They say and do stupid things, make promises no one could keep, lie, do just insane things, and everyone else is standing around going 'yup, that's people for you' like it's just okay. Or they're not, and I can't tell what the difference between one crazy, awful thing and another is that they switch up how they're acting." She looked, giving a half-hearted shrug as her thoughts swirled onto the last question.

"And I think it's pretty obvious why I'm hurt. Clive died and I ran Lona off just trying to help her. I thought I had something good, something amazing with Etienne and then I nearly destroyed that, and then it turns out he's a spy for some straight up evil mastermind doctor. And then he doesn't even have the decency to just be a bad guy and not...." She sighed and shook her head, "Etienne, not Cook. Cook is still totally in the bad guy column for me. It's just too much and I don't know what to do and no matter what I do someone is going to get hurt. No matter what I do I'm going to get hurt and so are other people. I don't know what to do."

"Hmmm." Jase pondered, turning over her words in his head. "The only thing I can think of is the old adage about no plan surviving contact with the enemy. And then tie that into Sun Tzu's words about knowing oneself first and foremost, and remaining formless and adaptable." He gave her a little squeeze. "You plan to stave off chaos, but it's a wall against an ocean. Water is always going to erode the wall, and chaos will always erode plans." He let out a small sigh. "It is frustrating to me that I cannot fully understand your conflict."

 "My mother abandoned me when I was eight, while my father was in prison." he explained quietly. "She left me with his parents, who were not prepared, really. I learned self-sufficiency and how unreliable people are very early. I'm telling you this so you understand that the pain it caused me was... small.  A sense of loss, a phantom ache.  And as I said yesterday, I don't feel fear - not like you do. I don't feel loneliness either. I enjoy the company of some people, but I don't need it or expect anything from them, which I think jars them a little. I don't feel ashamed, or embarrassed, or any of those things that anyone else would be able to help you with. I have my passion, and I direct it. I feel rage, hunger, desire, and am at peace with them. Medically, I am quite literally not equipped to empathise with other emotions - all I can do is try to understand, and try to support those I care about."

She blinked at that, her eyes going wide as he explained. "Oh." "I didn't know that. I'm sorry, about your mother. That sucks." Medically? There's something wrong with his brain? "I...I don't know what to say. I kinda want to say I envy you, but that seems mean and I probably don't understand really what you're going through." She squeezed his hand again.

"Not to be afraid or lonely, though. That's real attractive right now." Her mind played over her interactions with Jase - around school a little over the years and then farm more often over the past month or so. "Is, do you think it might be something Cook did to you?" She hadn't meant to ask that out loud, more she was musing over the puzzle of it. Once it was said, though, she watched him, curious what he would say or how he would react.

"It might be a side effect of genetic tampering. I'd considered it last night when reviewing what Lona told us about the meeting with Cook." Jason seemed completely at ease discussing it. "One out of five people diagnosed with psychopathy is neurologically so, the others are 'factor 2', more commonly known as sociopathy, usually due to trauma or abuse. In my case, brain scans performed by a doctor prior to my moving to Shelly show that my pre-frontal cortex and in particular my amygdala are underdeveloped." His hand toyed with her braid lightly. "I am fortunate that I am also intelligent enough to function at a high level - most teens with my condition can easily become violent criminals with no restraint." He met her gaze. "You are in no danger from me, however." he said sombrely.

He smiled a little at her, then. "Don't wish to be other than you are. I don't. Though I don't blame you for the fancy of being unafraid or lonely - those do seem to be miserable emotions. The only thing I really 'fear' is being locked up simply because I am different.  So I tried to hide myself somewhat - conceal the telltales of my nature - but I was frankly bad at it and since I abandoned the act it seems most people don't even realise what I am anyway. I think you are the fourth person I have told - Lona, Marissa and Lilly all know, and now you.  I'm telling you for several reasons - the most pertinent ones being 'I like you' and so that you understand my difficulties in turn."

"So... Here is what I understand from what you've said.  You fear the chaos of life, and your plan is your bulwark against it.  I don't know if you are religious - I am not - but you speak of your Plan in much the same way as, in another age, you might have spoken of God." His tone was matter of fact as his gaze stared across the fields, reflecting.  "Your need for there to be a Plan seems born out of fear and a need for some sense of control, but you need to start with controlling your Self.  Not repressing - controlling.  Control requires harmony between desire and reason.  You don't ride a horse by pulling frantically on the reins every time you feel it move a little fast.  Eventually it will bolt out of frustration, and you won't know how to stay on."

[Clara Lys Wright]

"I ripped it up." She was still processing psychopath and Jase Bannon. Lona knew? Her sister was good at keeping a secret then, and Clara was glad of that. There were several explosive ones amongst their band of mutants, not the least that they all were mutants. Psychics. Whatever. She gave a low laugh, not a particularly happy sound. "Apparently I ripped up God."

"You don't need God."   Jason said calmly.  "If there is a Supreme Being, then it is uncaring and beyond our concerns.  If there isn't, then it doesn't matter."  He smiled softly, his eyes studying her face.  "You, Clara, have more strength and passion than can be contained with a Plan.  You just need to harness that, steer and don't restrain."

She blushed again, looking away. Jase. Stop. Doing. That. "I'm not. Religious, I mean. For pretty much exactly what you just said. Either God's indifferent and cruel, or petty and cruel, or not there and it's all the same for us in the end." She sighed, letting out the last of the shakiness in her body. When she took her next breath she tensed again, but it was in preparation and focus, not distress. "So how do I do that? Any ideas?"

"Simple."  Jase shrugged, his arm still around her.  "You need to find something you want to do but have held back from doing out of fear - not necessarily fear for life and limb, but anxiety, worry about what others will think.  And then do it."  He frowned a little, his eyes studying her.  "I mean, that's what I would do, but I don't know if that would work for you."

"Maybe it is as simple as getting laid."  he added with a mischievous warm gleam in his eye.  "Or just kissing someone you want to."

She gave him a level look this time, one that said he was not going to be kissed by her for that. "I don't know something I haven't done. My fears, they're not like that. I'm not sitting in my room, afraid to go out. I'm out. Doing everything. And worried that it's still not enough." Her therapist was going to have a field day with this conversation. If she told her. Clara ran a hand down her face. "So, I should do - nothing?"

She made a face at that. "Yeah, that's not going to happen."

"Not at all."  Jase smiled and looked up at the sky, not at all fazed by her level look.  "It's about letting yourself enjoy the little things.  Connect through your senses.   Feed the inner animal some.  When's the last time you viewed food as something other than fuel?  Or sat and enjoyed the sun?  Slipped off your shoes and wiggled your toes in the grass?  You are doing a lot, but you are missing parts of the experience.  Be a human Being, rather than a human Doing.  Basic Daoism - Be, do not Do."

With that, he kicked off his own boots and, removing his arm from around her tugged off his socks, rubbing his bare feet on the grass.

"There's no point in surviving if you're not also living."  he said with a grin, turning his face towards the sky and closing his eyes.  "And living is not something that can be checked off a list."

"You've never seen my checklists," she quipped back. "They're very thorough." 

She watched him settle down into the landscape, zenning out to the natural world. She understood the theory. The practice just seemed...like a waste of useful time. And probably a bit itchy. She didn't take her boots off, but she did close her eyes and turn her face to the warmth of the sun. She tried to not think, a monumental task for the goal-oriented teen. She felt her awareness spill out out from her, roaming the area with interest. When she finally opened her eyes, she looked at Jase curiously. "You're brighter now. Your...Shine, I guess we're calling it. It's brighter."

"I suppose that makes sense." his reply came after a moment or two.  His eyes were still closed as he leaned back on his hands, face still upturned.  "I use it all the time, push it, play with it - show off with it."  His lips curved in a smile.  "Animals learn fastest and grow stronger through play."  His brow furrowed in slight concentration, and she could feel something there - not activity so much as a reaching sensation.  "I can feel you, too.  Probably a function of the Shine itself, rather than a gift that influences and senses it.  And useful for me, especially.  It helps connect me in a way I was not connected before."

His lips curved a little more, a hint of something playful and wicked there as well as in the eye he cracked open slightly, regarding her in turn.

"So tell me... How was the kiss?"

The level look was back. "On a scale of ask first to I have a boyfriend it landed squarely on a not gonna answer that." She was beet red and refusing to look his direction again. His words before inquiring on his kissing skills managed to belated elbow their way into her brain. She asked curiously, "What kind of connection?"

"A subliminal one, it seems.  Like a 'corner of the eye' sensation I get - not so definite as yours, I'm fairly certain.  It gets stronger through touch, especially when touching someone with the Shine.  An... awareness, I suppose. I'm not sure if I'm describing it accurately, but I'm going to work on exploring it."  he said, closing his eye again and going back to basking.

"Glad to know you liked it.  It was my first kiss."  He added with a faint twitch at the corner of his mouth.

Lone is going to kill me. She facepalmed and groaned. "You're supposed to...ng...guh...Jason!" The last was said with the full weight of all women ever frustrated with a man. 

"See, that's the good thing about being me."  He said as he lay back on the grass,  hands folded behind his head, one eye studying her with lazy warmth and amusement.  "Supposed to is for other people.  I felt like kissing you, and saw no harm in it, so I did.  Why not?  You're beautiful."

"The 'supposed to' wasn't about me," Clara said, taking a moment away from her own embarrassment to actually think deeply on him. It was a skill she was still learning was a skill. "Most people want their first kiss to be special. A childhood friend, if they're the precocious type. A first girlfriend or boyfriend. Or person," she tacked on belatedly, the voice in her head that was her mother reminding her that not all people were men or women. "That sort of thing. I'm flattered. Really. A lot. Most people hardly notice me beyond GPA-booster or ribbon-winner. I just, it should've been with someone that would have kissed you back."

Without feeling guilty. Without betraying someone else they care about.

"You started to, then pulled back."  Jase replied calmly.  "Which kind of plays into my theory, which is another reason I kissed you.  To see what would happen."  He smiled at her, then closed his impishly gleaming eye - a small mercy.

"My first kiss was special, for me.  And I won't forget it - benefits of a flawless 4K memory.  Maybe my next kiss will be returned more enthusiastically."

I did not! Lona's gonna kill me. I might ask her to at this point. "What theory?" Clara sidestepped the WMD that was she and Jase talking about kisses - or at least she hoped she was sidestepping it, because Jase kept circling back like a homing missile.

"That you stop yourself from doing what your instinctual self wants to do, because you're afraid of your desire."  Came the answer from the reclining Lucifer.  "Because desire cannot be Planned away.  The animal wants what it wants."

"Your horse is underdeveloped and undertrained." He returned with an air of unflappable certainty.  "You are not used to it, and it is not used to you.  You've got to start by giving it some rein on the small things, to get a feel for it and grow in confidence."

"And as for Etienne..."  His lips thinned a little.  "He is a liar and a spy.  I do think you're foolish for not telling him to take a hike.  But people are foolish all the time, and the world keeps on spinning.  I meant what I said about keeping him away from here, though."

"I know," she said softly. "He's just...more than that, too. Just like you're more than a diagnosis. And Marissa's probably more than a viper. Maybe. Even Devin is probably deeper than a shadow, though my main method of testing that maybe be punching him." She sighed, then nodded at his words. She put a hand on his arm, entirely sincere in her own words. "This is your home. Unless I thought you were hurt or in trouble and needed help specifically only he could give, I would never bring him here without your permission."

"Hmmph."  he acknowledged, opening his eyes and looking at her.  "If he betrays you - or us - again, the matter will be moot.  For now, though, like the Dude I shall abide."

He sat up, his playful mood dissipated under the chill of discussing Etienne, and glanced at the house before standing and offering her a hand up. "Come on.  There's some iced tea and I need to check on the chili.  The others will be here soon."

Clara pulled herself up off the ground and followed him in, thinking on horses and the smell of good chili.