Lonely Ghost (Sean)

[Beatrice Booker]

Beatrice Booker sat cross armed outside of Mr. Neville's office. She hadn't met the man... or maybe she had and just forgotten, but she didn't want to be here and didn't expect it to be a pleasant experience. Had it not been for her mother, she wouldn't be here at all. Though she didn't blame her, she'd already lost one child and Beat had taken years to adjust to the change in her life.... but she could handle it. She didn't need to see someone, she didn't need to talk it out or whatever crap her mom thought and she wasn't crazy. 

Her manifesting didn't help. Even though she'd just produced Ben, or some vague translucent likeness of Ben for a moment, it burned straight through and imprinted into Beat's mind, as well as her mother. The shrill noise that came out of her Mom's mouth was more terrifying, etched into her brain before she fainted leaving Beat sobbing alone until her dad got there.

She thought the house had been haunted, that her brother hadn't made it to heaven and was stuck like some awful horror movie. She was relieved when the recruiter came to tell her otherwise until she realized what it meant. That she was leaving. And leaving meant leaving her room, Ben's room, and not being there in case he was stuck, and needed someone. She wasn't sure if she believed that or not but if it was that way... she wasn't there for him now.

The thought lingered as she was called in. She hopped off the chair and smoothed out her cotton skirt before following inside. 

[Dr. Sean Neville]

New manifestations were rarely pleasant experiences. Meta-human powers manifested during puberty, a time when children and adolescents were already under a great amount of physical, hormonal, emotional, and peer stress. That was every teenager, regardless of meta-human status.

Then, for those who turned out to be meta, they developed super-human abilities, often with no warning whatsoever and no family history to serve as a support network. Powers had side effects, many of which were painful or overwhelming, and their abilities were always completely uncontrollable at first manifestation.

As such, being a young meta-human was hardly glamorous, regardless of the nature of the meta-human ability. Of course, some were more difficult than others.

As a telepath himself, Sean had particular empathy for young psychics. Mental powers often carried the double stigma attached both to being meta-human as well as because the abilities, or the side effects, shared some similarities with psychiatrist diagnoses, and children could be trapped by those incorrect assumptions. Or the fears that they would cause that in others.

This was why he kept tabs on all of the psychics that came through Hammel. He cross-referenced that with all of the students who might need to be flagged for a visit with him, for any reason at all. Beatrice Booker fell into both categories.

When he was ready to meet with her, he called her in, and he rose from his desk in anticipation of her entrance. “Hello, Beatrice,” he greeted her with a gentle smile.

[Beatrice Booker]

She looked up at the older man who was supposed to fix her or whatever. She really had no interest in therapists and had been through this ring around before thanks to her mom. Regardless, sugar got further than vinegar and she was going to be as sweet as pie if it meant less time in a chair across from a man taking notes on her like a science experiment.

"Hi. I'm Beat." She liked to introduce herself even if people knew her name or said it because she was NOT Beatrice, she was Beat. Beatrice was a stupid name that she resented almost as much as being here in the first place. She didn't fit in at this school and she, though she wouldn't admit it, was having issues making friends. Somehow a group of practically superheros with weird abilities all together didn't always exactly mesh... that and there seemed to be a lot of kids who were older than her which made sense considering people manifested at different times and she was somewhere near the earlier end of things.

She followed the man inside his office and took a seat, pushing herself to the back of the chair, her feet dangled over, not quite reaching the floor. "So... Is this where you analyze me and tell me I'm nuts?" She half joked.

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean took the correction without question or complaint. It was important for the purposes of self-determination that students have their name preferences acknowledged. As such, the psychiatrist held out one large hand for a handshake. “It’s nice to meet you, Beat. I’m Doctor Neville. You can call me ‘Doc,’ if you’d prefer.” There was no pressure for her to take the more familiar form of address, but he tried to establish proper boundaries as early as possible.

He overheard the thought about superheroes, which was a common misconception among the student body. It was something to discuss later, unless she voiced it today. Nobody here was a superhero. Everyone was simply a regular person with a special ability, each of whom required training before they could go out into the world as responsible, meta-human adults.

He detected the humor in her question, but the psychiatrist shook his head regardless. “No, and I don’t use that word.” He didn’t allow for use of pejorative terms against those with psychiatric diagnoses in this office or in his presence generally.

Offering her a smile, he said, “I arranged for you to come visit because I wanted to check in with you about how you’re doing.” With classes, with adjusting to the school as a whole, with her roommates, with her powers. All of them.

[Beatrice Booker]

Hearing her name said back to her made her second guess her choice to be a Beat. Actually, Rowan had given her that name and she was starting to wonder if she should transition to another nickname... something less stupid considering she did absolutely nothing with music and what people often asked her to do after hearing her name was to beat box which was certainly not going to happen. She supposed she could be a Tris... that was ok right? Tris? Hmm. 

"It's nice to meet you too." She droned out for the sake of being somewhat polite as she shifted in her chair trying to get more comfortable. 

"Oh." she answered when he told her that this was pretty much common practice. She felt some red coming to her cheeks for assuming. "Oh well... Hammels... swell. I totally always wanted to go to boarding school far away from home." False. Well, not totally false, she had often fantasied about boarding schools while reading books, like Harry Potter and Looking for Alaska, she'd even looked several up... but actually going was another thing. Especially so suddenly. 

"I mean... It's great. I'm enjoying it and the whole Illusions thing is kind of cool." It did have its perks. 

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean overheard her begin to mentally second-guess herself, which hadn’t been his intention when he’d repeated her name back to her. He had only wanted to show respect for her preferences and for her boundaries, by not deliberately disregarding the correction that she had made. As for any aesthetics or implications from the nicknames, this was something which she would have to work out for herself, without the interjections of a telepathic psychiatrist. It wasn’t his nickname; his opinion didn’t matter in this context.

Her sarcasm also wasn’t something about which he would remark. It was easy enough to parse, and while it also wasn’t called for, it wasn’t surprising either. Students only had a handful of reactions to being taken to Hammel in the first place, and several of those reactions qualified as “poor.”

Such reactions weren’t enough to discourage him. The psychiatrist wanted to know the ins and outs of student’s immediate reactions to the new surroundings. If there was something he could do to help them adjust, then it was all the better, which created the need for honest dialogue with the students. “How are you getting on with your roommates so far?”

Then she brought up her powers independently, which spared him the need to segue himself. “And how are the illusions going?”

[Beatrice Booker]

Beat shrugged when asked about her roommates. "Honestly I don't know them very well... We've said hi a couple times but then I mostly just go to my room or I visit my cousin." She explained as she picked split ends off of a lock of curly brown hair. 

"They seem nice enough though." She'd give them that. The brief interactions had been positive... for girls. Beatrice wasn't used to hanging out with girls her own age though, she'd always been about her brother and her cousin and their friends more so than her own and when her brother passed it only became harder. 

Her hands dropped to her sides as he asked about her abilities. "Fine." she said bluntly, "Great, I've managed to learn how to make spiders." She smirked pleased with the prank she'd pulled on Rowan. Granted, she'd only managed to maintain the spiders for a few moments, just long enough for him to notice them before they vanished leaving her absolutely wiped. "I kind of suck at it though... I mean, I'm ok at making scary things. The spiders were funny but the other things I didn't want to do... most of my abilities happen when I don't really expect it." Or feeling said.... or thinking about her brother, or home.... "I usually scare myself."

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean made a mental note of that. It was common enough when first coming to Hammel and moving into a dormitory. Given the nature of Hammel, students moved in and out of dormitories at random intervals, and there were almost always previously-established connections among one’s roommates when one first arrived. At least her roommates were not antagonistic, which was important. The psychiatrist then asked, “Do you have any interest in getting to know them better?”

If so, there were always ways of creating social bonds.

What she described with her power was a start. Sean was not a powers trainer, and thus he couldn’t say what the proper progression of her abilities should be. He also wasn’t an illusionist, and thus he couldn’t speak from any personal experience in that regard. Still, spiders sounded like progress.

He certainly empathized with the rest of it. Untrained abilities had a habit of growing uncontrolled when one was emotional, and often in frightening ways. “Have you discussed that with your trainer?” Specifically, the power problems.

The fear was within the psychiatrist’s purview. He asked gently, “When you say that you scare yourself, do you do that with your powers? Or with your thoughts?”

Her answer would determine the course of conversation.

[Beatrice Booker]

Beat blinked and shook her head no. She didn't have any interest in getting to know them better or anyone for that matter. She had her cousin, and her cousins friends she supposed. "No... I don't think they're the type of people i'd like." She said as she continued to go at the split ends in her hair. She all of a sudden wasn't feeling very like herself, she wasn't used to talking to people especially about her social problems. She hadn't felt like she could connect with people in a long time. Not since her brother passed and she didn't like letting people in and she didn't like her situation and she wished that her powers would just stop so she could go home and sleep in her bed. The bed that Ben slept in before his accident where she felt like he was there and everything was ok. Her arms made their way across her chest, pulling them tight as she tried to push the thought of Ben away. 

"No. Not really." She said, "I haven't been talking to my trainer about it. I figured if i was doing really bad they'd let me know." 

Beat's face fell as he continued to prod. This wasn't just an evaluation he was going to psycho analyze her and tell her things she didn't want to hear, the worst would be that after this conversation she should come back and talk again... that would mean he thought she was crazy and confirm that she was a reject freak. 

She opened her mouth to answer but no words came out. Beat didn't know how to answer because the two seemed to blend in and out of eachother so seamlessly that she was never sure what was in her head and what wasn't and if her projections were her head and if they were... if they were... that'd be worse than anything.

"Both." She managed to push out casting her eyes on the floor to avoid him seeing her struggle to keep tears inside her head. She wanted to leave. She wanted to leave right now and as the feelings continued to bubble up she fought twice as hard to keep them down. 

Behind Beat spiders started to appear to crawl on the walls, monsters from her dreams, and the decaying face of a boy who hardly looked like a boy at all, each image only lasting a moment before vanishing away. "It's happening isn't it?" She was too afraid to open her eyes to check, but she knew the feeling. 

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean considered that a rather snap judgment, given that she admitted that she didn’t have extended interaction with her roommates, and that she hadn’t reported any problems with them. It was possible that they were friendly and would get along well. However, the psychiatrist was familiar with the cues and language people used when they tried to dodge a social situation, and it was evident that she was making excuses. This was something that they could work on in the future. “Perhaps you could join a club to meet some people,” he suggested. There were many good clubs offered by the Hammel, and they each contained proactive students of different temperaments.

“You should talk to your trainer,” Sean advised her. He wasn’t a powers trainer, he had never wanted to be a powers trainer, and the psychiatrist didn’t think that he would be particularly successful in that job. He couldn’t speak from the experience of a powers trainer, but he could speak from the experience of someone who had developed a close relationship with his trainer as a student. The only way to address power problems and concerns about side-effects and potential long-term ramifications was to work closely with one’s trainer. The psychiatrist was sympathetic; he knew the difficulties inherent in psychic powers, but Beat was too young and inexperienced to weather this alone.

At her question, Sean lowered his mental shields a bit so that he could see if she was projecting with her powers. Lo and behold, she was, and the nightmarish cascade behind her and around her on the walls were enough to haunt some of the younger students. His voice steady, the psychiatrist confirmed, “It is. They’re flicking in and out.”

As he wasn’t her trainer, Sean would not force her to open her eyes and face the images. Considering how illusions worked, she was undoubtedly already exposed to them on one mental level or another, conscious or subconscious. There was no reason to force her to confront them a second time during a power slip, particularly when Sean – unlike his partner – was not prone to nightmares.