neededlassie | Video/Action for Violet City

Uh-huh. He's been taking care of me since I got here.

...Yeah, I like ice cream. [He's not sure he agrees with that, but okay.] We're in Violet City.

Hey, so am I! Perfect. [There'll be ice cream, and plenty of it, delivered up to the room in less than an hour. The plus side of having such a small city, everyone knows where everyone else is.

Jack won't intrude by coming with it, but he'll be in Violet City for a few more days, just in case. His smile becomes a bit more sober.]

Listen. I know a couple things about worrying about people. You know? So if you want someone that's not a boring adult to talk to, look me up, okay?

Really? [He doesn't know what to expect but when he gets the ice cream it will be a welcome surprise.]

...Okay. Thanks, Jack. I'll make sure to call you when he's better so you don't have to worry about us anymore.

What, me, worry? There's nothing to worry about. I told you. Just wait and see. [Except he totally will, even if he'll never admit it.]

And call me any time if you need to. Otherwise it's just me and the peanut gallery. [Patch chirps unhappily at him for the slight, but it just makes him grin.]

...What if it takes him six months to wake up?

[He sounds like he's speaking from experience.]

[Well, that's no good. Jack's smile drops a bit more before it perks up again and he leans closer to the screen.]

You wanna hear a secret?

[Shaun leans in closer as well, but his expression doesn't change from worry.]

...What is it?

Something kinda like this happened to me back home. A good friend of mine, he almost died because of this really bad guy. I thought he did die. He wasn't gone six months, but it really felt like it.

Turns out, he was just waiting to get even stronger to take out the bad guy. [He laughs.] And oh man, did he, once he came back.

I've heard people here talking about stuff like people falling asleep really suddenly and waking up later. I don't think it'll take anywhere like six months. But even if it does, your friends here'll help make the time fly, and I know he's dreaming about you the whole time, too.

[Shaun goes quiet for a long moment. Partly, it's because there's a lump in his throat.

There aren't any bad guys to fight here, why would Norman need to go to sleep?]

...My dad was in a coma for six months and when he came back he didn't...smile anymore.

I don't want Norman to be like that when he wakes up. I don't want to lose him like that. My friends have told me that he'll wake up, but how do I know he'll wake up the same?

[Ah, kid, get him right in the heartplace, why don't you? Sometimes, there are kids even the Guardians can't help, but that doesn't make him want to try any less. He sighs.]

You just gotta believe that he will. Even if it's really not that easy.

I think if this place can manage giant, electric squirrels and who knows what else, not to mention pulling all kinds of people like us together, it can manage just about anything.

[Shaun sniffles pathetically, and he has to wipe his eyes and look away from the camera.]

It's really hard to believe that. That's just never how anything's worked in my life before...

I know this place does really awesome things, but bad things just follow me around everywhere. Everyone I care about gets hurt.

Hey. [Definitely one of the ones they can't really help. Of all the times to be without his powers.] None of this is your fault. Sometimes bad things just happen.

And if believing in good things was all that easy, nobody'd ever need me. [The grin comes back, wry and almost amused.] Doesn't mean good things don't happen just as much as bad things.

[Life has been terrible to Shaun Mars. Which is almost ironic because until he was 8, it was pretty much picture perfect suburbia.]

...Sometimes, though, a whole lot of bad things happen at once. Or good things that happen are still really sad.

[Like his father waking up but with severe depression, or Shaun being rescued but his dad getting shot.]

Coming here was one of the first good things that happened to me in a long time. And even that was really scary at first.

...What do you mean 'nobody'd ever need you'?

[Yeah, probably better to sidetrack this conversation before they both end up depressed.

Jack leans back away from the screen, ruffling his own hair.]

Back home, there's Guardians that protect kids. Making good things happen to make people happy is a really good way to do that.

[Shaun's ability to make other people sad is practically an unconscious superpower at this point.

...That sounds like a thing that Shaun's needed in his life, yeah.]

...What kind of good things?

[Everyone can use a magic snowball to the face now and then.]

You ever have a snowday off from school?

Yeah, at least once a year. There's usually a big blizzard sometime around my birthday.

[Jack could not look any more smug if he tried]

Yeah, I invented those.

No way. You can't invent snow, that's part of the weather and stuff.

That's what you think.

[Okay, so he didn't invent SNOW, exactly, but he totally takes credit for the things kids do with it, okay?]

If I had my powers instead of being stuck all human again, you'd think differently.

You have snow powers? Are you an alien?

[he's met aliens, you see.]

[So has Jack. Sort of. That's why he laughs.]

Naw. Just a spirit. Kinda like a ghost but about a million times more awesome.

Oh.

Does that mean you...died?

[This is NOT the direction this conversation was supposed to go. Darn it.]

Well... yeah. Technically, I guess. But I got better.

[No it's okay this is more okay than comas because people coming back from the dead is encouraging.]

Was your friend who almost died a spirit too?

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