Refuge Behind The Stairs(Sean)

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Today had already started out as a bad day. Upon waking up, she discovered that someone had used up nearly all of her conditioner! (hint: it was her) Who would do such a vile thing? Now she had to go out and buy more! And while that wasn't really much of a problem, especially since Mei always got overnight shipping, this meant she was going to have to wait for it. And Mei disliked waiting. Then, as she was putting on her make-up, her good eyeliner pencil broke, forcing her to use her backup liner, which wasn't half as good as the pencil. She would have to reorder that too, so Mei resolved to put those orders in before leaving for class today.

However, when she got onto the website and clicked past the checkout....her credit card was declined.

What!?

Mei couldn't believe it! Her credit card was never declined! (yes it was) She'd gone to check the balance only to find that the account had been frozen completely! By her mother. The next three hours(forget about school, this was important!) involved a phone conversation that had Mei pacing from one end of her dorm room to the other at a brisk pace, begging, pleading with her arrogant, spiteful, wretched mother to fix it. She did not win this battle. By the end of it, Mei was already well late for the school day, had a headache the size of Vermont, and had terrible anxiety over the fact that she was now penniless. Poor. Destitute. How was she supposed to get her meals now?

She would have to go to *gasp* the cafeteria! Where there were *double gasp* people!!

Granted Mei had been to the cafeteria on several occasions before. She'd gone to class and to gym before, and those had crowds of people who thought too. Mei had been at Hammel for a good four years, therefore she had an adequate level of control over her telepathy, in blocking out the incessant inner voices of the masses. However, this task was made ever more difficult when she was agitated, especially when her head was pounding from the headache brought upon by her mother.

But no, as antisocial and a hermit as Mei was, she was also equally as stubborn and would not give the satisfaction of having disrupted her day. Therefore, Mei popped two advil, brushed her hair(it was more wavy than straight today, she lost time in preparing herself this morning due to the phone call), donned her darkest, most 'stay-away' clothing, and boldly rushed out into the wilderness of society.

The next few hours was mostly a blur, the length of it cluttered up with whispers and ghostly tickles on the back of her neck. Mei kept herself composed, holding her chin high like the Lady she was, pretended there was nothing amiss until the last possible second. It was the lunchroom that did it. Combined with the sinking feeling in her gut of having to go there in the first place the moment she stepped through those double doors, the girl stopped, staring off hopelessly into that sea of people, each one projecting everything they were straight at her with all their might.

Why is she just standing there?
She can't think that those clothes look good. Who wears all black these days except dumb emo kids?
I bet she's done XXX and XXX. Probably XXX too.
What a weirdo.

Mei turned her head trying to pinpoint the source of those 'comments', but to her, everyone 'sounded' exactly the same. They were coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once, both inside and outside of her head. Mei made it to the line and was trapped in it and it's slow moving pace, the crowd of students mulling through like cattle, their shoulders pressed up against the person beside. Her thin fingers gripped tightly to her food tray, so much it was shaking. Too close. Too much! She couldn't breath! Mei closed her eyes tightly, but while it blocked out her sight, it did not block out the noise.

"Hey! Move it, keep the line going!" a boy's voice called out to her. Fingers touched her shoulders. Mei flinched away. Before she knew what was happening, the goth girl was running towards the exit, pushing past people harshly without remorse, her hand covering over half her face as a tear streamed down the other side.

Even in the halls, there was no place to go, they were everywhere. Even when alone, they were still there, she could hear them through the walls, down the halls, outside the building....! "Help!" she cried silently, gripping her hands to her head, though even her thoughts felt like nothing but a whisper against the throngs of voices which kept chattering away in the face of her distress. "Someone!"

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean had never lacked patience. Even as a teenager, he’d had more patience for his age, which hadn’t helped his reputation among the student body as a goody-two-shoes (at best) and as some sort of inhuman freak (at worst – and coming from other super-powered teenagers, that had been an incredible insult). It might have been social poison as a teenager, but it had serve him well in coping with his powers as a student, and then through four decades of adulthood. He wouldn’t have survived to his late-fifties without patience.

Or without a number of other characteristics that he had developed or nurtured over his lifetime.

One of those characteristics was empathy for anyone suffering around him.

Another was his sense of responsibility for those around him. Some people considered that meddlesome of him, but he considered it a moral obligation. If he saw suffering around him, then he had a moral obligation to alleviate it to the best of his ability. It didn’t matter that he could perceive more than the average non-psychic, or that he lived in a non-psychic, baseline society, because he was a telepath, and he had developed his moral code absent the cultural cues of broader non-psychic society.

That sense of responsibility, and that sense of empathy, went into overdrive when telepathic teenagers were involved. He had been there, many years ago, and he had never forgotten how helpless he had felt when in pain or overwhelmed. He had never forgotten what a savior Robert Hopkins had been during those difficult years. He owed it to young telepaths to pay it forward.

So when he had heard the desperate projection of Help!, he was on his feet and halfway to the door before hearing the follow-up, Someone!

The psychiatrist used his own telepathy to track down the source of the cry, identifying it as belonging to Mei Seomoon, and finding her quickly in the halls, nearly under the stairs. It took longer for Sean to reach her than for him to hear her – thought traveled far faster than the legs of a fifty-eight-year-old man, even one with the stride of someone as tall as Sean Neville was. However, mere moments later, he was close.

I’m here, he projected back to Mei. You aren’t alone.

He meant that in terms of her struggle. He knew that telepaths were never alone as a function of their powers.

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There was nowhere for the goth girl to turn. Nowhere to hide. Still, despite it’s futility, she searched for one. Even if she couldn’t get away from the voices, she could get away from the converging mass of bodies that were shuffling their way through the halls of the school. That would be, at the very least, one less thing she had to worry about. Because she had enough to deal with inside her head without hearing the judgements made on her while she tried to get a grip on them.

It might take a long time this time. Or it might be short. It varied, and while Mei would like to say she was used to having to deal with it on her own, it didn’t make it any less terrifying. Overwhelming. She could so easily lose herself in that sea of voices, her body becoming nothing but an empty vessel as her own consciousness struggled to swim to the surface.

She hadn’t realized when or where she finally crouched down, out of the way from foot traffic, hiding behind a set of stairs with her hand covering her ears as if that would block out the voices. It didn’t.

Her eyeliner was dripping along with the tears flowing freely from her eyes. She probably looked terrible. Fleur would no doubt point it out, the insensitive bitch who thought meta-powers were some sort of awesome privilege. If she knew the struggle…if she went through even half of it…Mei was certain she would break. Mei felt like she had already, over and over again. And she knew she would again. It would never end…

Mei didn’t open her eyes when she heard the doctor’s reassurances. They cut through the voices clear and sharp, it would be hard for her to ignore their strength. And in turn, they would give her strength. That was the hope, at least. Mei shook her head. ”I’m scared,” she replied, though again it seemed like her voice was but a whisper. She wasn’t sure if she heard it herself, much less if Dr. Neville had. ”Make it stop…please.” She had no idea if she was projecting just to the man in front of her or to anyone within range of ‘hearing’. Mei just couldn’t tell…