Too relaxed ( Tag: Wren )

[Benton Barrett]

It was probably a mistake to try and relax. He’d been running around all day, mostly enjoying the fact that he could do that, but his muscles were sore, and he wanted to relax. So what did he do? His favorite relaxation technique – he went to the pool. Normally he wouldn’t, but he felt exceptionally warm, so rather than go for a deep swim, he decided he’d rather just sort of float.

It took a little hunting, but he found a comfortable looking raft, and he dumped it in the water, before following it in. He was wearing his red swimming trunks as he normally did, and for the most part, he just wanted to ease around for a bit. After getting balanced, and situated effectively on the middle of the soft blue raft, he just sort of leaned back, and let himself drift. There was just enough water flowing over the edges of the raft to be comfortable, coupled with his feet dipping into the relaxing liquid.

He didn’t even notice he was falling asleep. It just sort of hit him like a sack of oranges.

That, however, was a bit of a problem. He was in a comfortable position, and through his dozing, he didn’t even notice how cool – he was getting. The raft had come to settle on the side of the pool, near the wall, and without any force to move it around, it simply sat there.

Benny was out for a good hour, while his wet body was exposed to room temperature air and a cool pool. To compensate, of course, his ability started working its magic, and near him there appeared to be a bit of… frost, or light slush, radiating outward. It wasn’t wrapped around his feet or anything, but the water around him was definitely colder than one would expect, considering the normal temperature of the gym’s pool.

Ah, the joys of being a meta.

[Wren O'Hara]

Wren, who was largely a creature of habit, was predictably changing into his swimming ensemble in the chlorine-scented locker room of the Hammel natatorium. He’d already swum once today already, but only one person had borne witness to the fact, and the only thing better than a good swim, in his opinion, was two good swims in the same day.

He ran his body quickly under the shower, as though he ever spent enough time outside of the pool water to warrant it. Afterward, he walked purposely into the high-ceilinged pool room and…

“Hey,” he called out to the boy on the raft. He received no reply, which was odd; in any case, he figured, he could swim over faster than he could safely run around the wet edge of the pool. He dove in from the side, disappearing completely on contact with the water and emerging somewhere around the middle of the pool. He made a few powerful strokes toward the boy. It was then that his hand sliced through something thicker than water on the pull, and he withdrew his hand immediately and floated there, perturbed.

He examined the water around the float and found small clusters of ice surrounding it. The second thing he realized, naturally, was that the water was freezing – or, at the very least, it was definitely colder than the recommended ideal temperature of 78 degrees Fahrenheit, which Wren largely preferred over this.

“Hey!” he said again, anchoring himself to the edge of the raft and disturbing it slightly. “Are you alright?” He shook the side of the blue float with one large, muscled arm; it protested by making a rubbery noise against the friction of the concrete.

Now more alarmed than anything, he hoisted himself up onto the near side of the pool and leaned over the boy, this time shaking his shoulder instead. He was almost completely transparent, but that didn’t matter…

“Hey. Hey. Hey! Do you need the nurse or something?”

[Benton Barrett]

It was one of those good dreams that you don't want to wake up from. He'd never seen the ocean, but he'd been out on a lake once or twice, and that's where he was, now. Riding on a small boat, his sister and his mom all laughing and having a good day. The sun was shining, but it was a little cold. That was all right, though, he had a jacket...

Hey, are you alright?

Dream!Benny glanced around uncertainly.

The voice came again, more frantic, and Benny practically jumped awake, flailing just a bit as he did, his arms hitting water. He took a deep breath, startled by the shakes to his shoulder. His brows furrowed - his eyes were still a little sleep-blurry... because he couldn't see anyone else.

Wait. It was like watching that Predator movie.

"Woah. I mean... what?" He shook his head, moisture being spattered around his by his hair. Nope. He wasn't still dreaming. Or hallucinating. Something weird was going on, though. He peered closely at the weirdly... transparent person who had been shaking him. Or at least he hoped it was a transparent person, and not... like, a ghost.

Were ghosts real?

"Er. Uh. No, I'm fine. Just..." He realized, of course, that he was in slushy section of pool. Typical. "I think I fell asleep." He muttered. "Are you... invisible?" He asked, pushing himself up, grabbing the edge of the pool, and using it to transfer himself over onto less-rocking ground. It was a dumb question, because yes, obviously, he was. Sometimes Benny was surprisingly bad at life.

Now must have been one of those times.

[Wren O'Hara]

Fortunately, the boy on the raft came to, and rather spectacularly to boot. Wren waited patiently as the boy lifted himself onto the edge of the pool. Wren offered him a low-opacity hand, although he wasn’t sure if it would be seen.

He didn’t appear to be injured; mostly, he just looked groggy.

And, of course, one of the first things out of his mouth…

“Only in water,” Wren replied a touch defensively, as though it had been an accusation instead of merely a question. Nevertheless, he was relieved; witnessing some random guy’s death would have really put a damper on the whole relaxing swim thing. The chlorinated water was rolling off of him in beads, and he was slowly but surely regaining visibility. He rubbed his transparent palms over his arms to help speed the process along.

“Dude,” he said emphatically, surveying his sleepy new companion and then looking pointedly at the slush that had gathered around the raft. “You scared the crap outta me.”

Normally he wouldn’t have stated the fact so bluntly, but he didn’t take well to the idea of pool accidents as a general rule. As far as he was concerned, water was a safe space, and he intended to keep it that way.

He paused as he ruminated on all of these things, still studying the kid.

“Are you cold?” he asked, after a moment. “I mean, do you need a towel or something? Shock blanket? Apple cider?”

He looked back at the ice, but only because it was hard to keep his eyes away. He wasn’t going to bring it up, though. Nope, not Wren – three full years at Hammel was more than enough for him to know that the weird kept getting weirder and asking about the weird just made things… well, weird.

[Benton Barrett]

He looked a little confused at the general direction of the voice… watching in actually a lot of interest as he slowly became less transparent. Now that was a power. Who cared if it only worked when he was in water? That was pretty awesome one way or the other. The cold water on his skin was already starting to give him goosebumps. How long had he been asleep? Long enough to be in a little bit of trouble, it seemed.

Wincing a bit, Benny shook his head.

“I’m sorry! I don’t usually get all sleepy in the pool. I just needed to relax, and there was a raft… so…” Next logical thing, right…? “I didn’t mean to scare you. Or fall asleep. Or… ice the pool.” That was a new one. No doubt he was currently siphoning heat at an accelerated rate - thankfully the guy hadn’t tried to help him out of the water, or keep in contact more than just a bit on the shoulder.

The question about the cold? His lower lip was already starting to move in time with his teeth. Open air plus cold water did not a good combination make. “I have a towel. Do you have a shock blanket or apple cider?” He asked, unable to keep the smile from his face. That was an interesting offer. First he thought he’d gotten before.

“Thanks. For waking me up I mean. Not a fan of ice skating, actually.” Not that that was possible in the current state of the pool, but it was worth saying, though mostly as a joke. He looked around for his towel, spotting the red thing hanging on the back of one of the benches. Hustling over to it, he snatched it up. “Normally I just do laps, but I’ve been running all over the place today.”

He was walking back, patting it over exposed skin to get rid of the water. “I’m Benny, by the way. Nice to meet you!”

[Wren O'Hara]

The odd thing about being invisible sometimes was that people often forgot you could still see them, even when they couldn’t see you; Wren watched with vague amusement as Benny’s eyes searched for him, finally found him, and lingered.

“It happens,” Wren said sagely. It didn’t, really, or at the very least he hoped it didn’t happen often, but it seemed like the nice thing to say. “I’m just really glad you weren’t… uh, you know.”

He looked down at his hands, which were up to at least 50% opacity by now. The other boy went to grab his towel, and Wren scratched the back of his head absentmindedly.

“There’s a shock blanket in the locker room,” he said. “It’s wrapped up above the fire extinguisher in there. Just in case you ever need to know,” he said amidst a good-natured chuckle. “Rain check on the apple cider, though… sorry.”

He’d been really upset, okay?

“Sure. I mean, I’d hope someone would wake me up, too,” he said. He offered a warm smile and another half-hearted laugh at the ice skating joke. He’d always thought his power had been the worst power a swimmer could possibly have, but he had to admit that the idea of unintentionally turning the water to slush was a little unnerving.

The talk of laps snapped him out of his thoughts, and he raised his eyebrows in interest.

“Oh yeah? You on the team?” he asked. He’d never seen the other boy before, but there could have been any number of reasons for that. He smiled. “Nice to meet you, too. I’m Wren.”

[Benton Barrett]

He nodded, though he grinned, as well. The guy was being really nice, considering he'd found a half-frozen kid in the pool. The situation could have been way more awkward, but... well, Wren was doing him the courtesy of not weirding out on him. "Me too. That'd be a terrible place to kick it." He wrinkled his nose, mostly because yeah, there were worse places to die, but he couldn't really think of any off the top of his head. Really, kind of morbid. 

While he was toweling off, already feeling the bite of the exceptionally cool air on his damp skin, he looked up at the still-see-through, but at least more there guy. He actually knew the location of a shock blanket? And a fire extinguisher? Also, who used a fire extinguisher at a pool? It just seemed so weird - but he wasn't going to argue the point. Probably some regulation thing. 

"No no, totally good information to have. Though if the pool is on fire, I think we have bigger problems..." He joked along with the other guy, unable to stop his grin as the guy offered a rain check on the apple cider. 

"Oh man, I totally hold people to their rain checks. I've got a book and everything." No, not really, but it was an amusing thought nonetheless. "But I'll save it for when it gets really cold, then you can show me where they keep all the apple cider." He was teasing, a little bit, but he didn't want to make the other guy too uncomfortable. Some people might think he was being completely serious about the rain checks, and might not like the idea of someone who took stuff so seriously.

"Oh, no. I might consider it, but I can't really swim a lot any more." He glanced pointedly at the slush. "We only get along for short periods of time." He shrugged, absently. "I'd like to, because I need something to do to tide me over until Soccer season starts." Because that was happening, no ifs, ands, or buts. "What about you, Wren? Are you on the team?"