Same Old Drag (John)

Josh glanced over at the waitress, his companion's question finally bringing his attention to her outfit. "Ah," He offered, mentally scanning his bar archives in an attempt to remember what was common dress code. That simply wasn't one of the things he paid attention to. "It's fairly common, yes. But some places prefer jeans and t-shirts." He added hurriedly, deciding that perhaps next bar they chose to meet at would be one of those.

"She's the young lady who lives with Sean, isn't she? We've met before." She'd seemed nice enough, though even when he'd been staying with his friend last fall after the incident they'd had very little interaction. Mostly she'd stayed out of his way. "She's very pleasant."

He quirked an eyebrow at the comment about property damage. "I thought that was the entire point of Hammel, teaching children to avoid property damage. That's been the only argument anyone has ever given me for having the students at Hammel as opposed to integrating them into public school."

He noted the almost jealous tone John used when inquiring about his job. "Not exactly busy so much as stressful. It would be so nice if judges would be on time so I didn't have to wait for two hours in the courtroom while they do whatever the hell it is they do."

That was the worst part about being a lawyer: waiting on judges. There ought to be a required course on punctuality for anyone wishing to sit on the bench.

"She can't help her power," Josh objected in defense of the young woman living with Sean. "It isn't like you get to line up and say oh, I would like to talk to butterflies. oh, I would like to be able to stab people with my hands."

John was a meta he ought to understand that.

Oh. Apparently he did, as his rant against meta-specific schools clarified. "It's extremely unfair to classify all meta-humans as having the same needs." He nodded in agreement, "One-size-fits all is hardly ideal. And one-size-fits all segregation is even more detrimental. What are we trying to teach the students, that they should always be quarantined? That they're a menace to society?" Some people thought that; Kathleen was more than enough proof of that, and Hammel whisking away her brother surely hadn't helped.

"Unfortunately, they do not allow sandwiches in court. Even more unfortunately, certain judges don't believe in such things as lunch breaks, although I suppose it is much worse for their staff."

He snapped an onion ring in half, munching on it as he contemplated just how awful it would be to work for someone who didn't believe in lunch.

"But are you sure you're supposed to complain about your employer?" He asked after a moment, jumping back to the topic of Hammel. "don't they monitor that or something?"

Blue eyes widened in shock at the assertion L.C. had a temper. "Really? She was always perfectly polite when I met her."

Of course, he'd spent a good deal of time in bed during his stay with Sean and it wasn't as if L.C. had any reason to visit his bedroom.

And of course his stay at Chateau Neville had been enough to prove to him that John was absolutely correct, and some metas were menaces to society. His face darkened at that thought; he really was powerless in the face of any meta who wanted to abuse their power, and he felt that. And he hated feeling that way and so he tried not to think about it.

"I know." He admitted, dropping his gaze to his plate. "Some are. But it isn't fair to assume that they all will be. Some baseline humans," He grimaced; he still hated that word, "are menaces, too. Genetics has nothing to do with that."

He tapped the other half of his onion ring against his plate, feeling somewhat relieved to know that John didn't worship Hammel the way most of its employees did. "I have a friend who tried to escape when he was there. He still opposes their recruitment." And his shadows weren't that likely to hurt people as far as Josh could see. "I do agree that training students to control abilities that are potentially harmful to themselves or others is a good thing, but I see no reason that the public school system can't be equipped to handle meta students. There are ESL programs and gifted programs and programs for students with disabilities and yes, some school districts can only support one school in the area having them, but that is still far preferable to having no choice about being taken away from family and friends at a time that is already vulnerable. I'm not opposed to Hammel's existence, I'm opposed to it being the only option, and a mandatory one at that."