Lights Out [Zac Teagan]

[Marley Rose]

Marley was used to the concept of sharing her bedroom with other kids. She was used to the concept of sharing her room with boys, even. So her situation not, at Hammel, wasn't any different than any given point in her childhood up until her brother showed up at her foster family's door. Of course, just because she was used to the situation didn't mean she particularly enjoyed it.

She had moved into the room in the middle of the summer after her old all-girls room politely asked her to find a new place to stay. She didn't care. She just told a dorm adviser and packed up. The only place left open was a co-ed room - which her soon to be adoptive parents didn't really appreciate - but yet again, Marley didn't care.

She was sitting at her desk, shooting rubber band at painting of a red, dripping target she put up on the wall. A small trashcan sat underneath. Her roommates were facing away from her, nobody really paying mind to each other. Marley hadn't gotten to know the boy she moved in with or the girl who had show up soon after, and didn't particularly care to. They had been around long enough for Marley to figure out the girl could duplicate herself, and god was that annoying sometimes.She wasn't quite sure what was up with the guy - Zac she believed - but he seemed to have been around a while and hadn't had any slip ups with whatever power he had - as far as Marley knew.

Marley tried her best to keep everything under control. Energy was a hard thing to balance, and tonight she was feeling particularly jittery. It was raining, so she couldn't just leave and go paint somewhere until all hours of the night like she usually did, so she was kind of stuck in the room.

Aiming up a shot at the spray-painted target, Marley let go of the end of the rubber band. It back fired, though, and shot her in the sensitive area between her thumb and her forefinger. Yelling in pain, she shook out her hand as the lights in the room brightened. Before Marley could even realize what was happening, two of the lightbulbs exploded, and the others dimmed back down to nothingness.

She couldn't see more than a foot in front of her, and she was pretty sure she had heard Teagan or one of her duplicates scream. There was a long moment of silence before Marley finally groaned, "...fuuuuuck." and threw herself face first down onto her bed.

[Zac Stanson]

It had been a long day. One of those days where nothing happened. Not a particularly bad day, but not good either. Just dull. He had had boring lessons all day, lessons that involved being cooped up in a classroom for an hour doing work. Zac didn't like work. Not this kind.

So when he finally got back to his recent dorm all he wanted to do was something. He had actually requested a change and was surprised when he actually got it. Apparently having an Ergo, Hydro and Pyro in one room wasn't really fair. Besides, it didn't help that they were all dicks. So Zac had moved out of his boy's dorm to a co-ed.

Like most things in life, his expectations outweighed reality. He had been told stories of sex every night and massive parties in the room. What he didn't expect was the quiet. A drastic change from shouting every night to shouting never. Zac really shouldn't have been surprised. He was in with only two other girls for company. What wouldn't he give for a guy to move in. Or a slut.

At that moment he was in the common room, flicking a pen up and down. Dear lord, he was bored. He was aware of one of the girls - he thought it was Marley, but it could just as easily have been Mia or even Anna - shooting a rubber band toward a target board painted on the ceiling. Suddenly a light bulb smashed with a bang above him. A kick of adrenaline pumping into him, he quickly sheltered himself from falling glass by curling up in a ball. Teagan, the girl Zac met at Camp, screamed but sounded okay. Once he had realised everyone was okay he heard a low groan that could have also been the f-bomb. Then all the laughte had been trying to suppress for the last minute or so came bursting out.

"How the fuck did that happen?" Zaac asked through laughter.

[Teagan Rae Brooks]

Teagan was half-aware of what was going on in her dorm room. She knew her roommates, well....enough to know that Marley didn't really seem to like her and that Zac was annoying and obnoxious. She'd met him at camp and seen his butt, which was pretty much her fault since she'd dared him, but then again, her duplicate suggested it. And now she was sharing a dorm with him. Oh, how interesting life had been.

Zac was clicking a pen, an extremely irritating fidgety gesture that was beginning to grate on her nerves. She was getting close to screaming at him, as she was paging through a science text book, trying to read. She'd read the same paragraph about five times by now. "Would you--" she began, but stopped short, letting out a yelp as she heard lightbulbs shatter. She reached up, putting her arms over her head on instinct to shield herself, although with her hair, she wouldn't be surprised if a piece of glass got lost in it.

Zac was laughing and Marley seemed to be groaning about it. Well, now she really couldn't read her textbook. She shut it, even more annoyed and set it down beside her, looking into the darkness. She sighed. "Do we seriously have to have the lights replaced again?"

[Marley Rose]

"My bad," Marley said with a sigh, never afraid to own up to her powers even if it did mean ridicule. She found her way to her bed, and reached under a box, grabbing a couple flashlights that she kept on hand. She flicked one on and shined it around the room, finding Zac who was laughing hysterically, and tossing one his way, secretly hoping it hit him in the face.

She rolled the other to Teagan seeing as she didn't really want to hurt her. Not yet anyway. Some of her dupes maybe. But clearly Marley couldn't control herself any better than Teagan. "You get used to it... or not," Marley said. "Seeing as my last group of roommates kicked me out." She muttered the last part, still bitter about the way she was treated.

She turned to Zac who wondered out loud what had happened. "Ergokenesis. There's a storm outside. I'm a little hyped up on energy. When that happens I tend to make things explode.... I wouldn't touch me if I were you." She left it at that, raising an eyebrow at the implication. She didn't actually think she could make Zac explode even if she wanted to, but the fact that he probably didn't know for sure made the threat even more entertaining.

[Zac Stanson]

Out of the darkness a stray torch came flying. It hit Zac on the bridge of the nose, but he was laughing too much for it to really bother him. Well. It did really hurt, like most things when they hit your nose.
"Argh, shit! That actually hurt, you know." Zac said, still laughing. He was pretty sure no one would take his expression of pain seriously when laughing, so he tried to calm down. When he finally stopped, he saw a light coming from Marley and heard her say about her Ergokinesis.

"I had an Ergo in my old dorm. You would not believe how many light bulbs we went through. Not to mention televisions, radios and laptops. But I never exploded, so that's good." Zac seriously doubted that Marley could make him explode. Humans weren't electrical. Silly Marley. Zac had half a mind to sneak up behind her and grab her arm or something, but that might come across as weird.

[Teagan Rae Brooks]

"Whatever. Guess I can't complain when I have my duplicates running around everywhere," Teagan said with a shrug, even though it couldn't be seen in the dark. Marley couldn't control herself any better than her, so she had no reason to be upset with her. After all, all three of them were fairly new to Hammel. It was kind of dangerous for them to all be rooming together, wasn't it?

She grabbed the flash light and shined it on Zac, who was complaining about his nose. She couldn't help but laugh. Marley had hit him spot on. She listened as Marley explained her power and what happened during a storm and then Zac went on about his old dorm mates and how one of them was an Ergokinetic. "Well it's good to know that neither of us will explode. At least hopefully not," she said, more so to him than to Marley.

"What's all of this about an old dorm anyway? Did you get kicked out too?" she asked, feeling the odd sensation through her body that could only mean one thing. One of her dupes had come out to play and she saw her come up behind Zac as her flashlight was still shining on him, with a devious grin on her face. She tried to figure out which dupe this was as she watched the dupe reach out and grip Zac's shoulders suddenly.

[Marley Rose]

"Energy isn't just electrical," Marley pointed out to Zac. "I've melted about 50 pens since being here so far. Heat energy. And I'm surprised you guys can sleep when I glow at night sometimes." She rolled her eyes, hating that she had to put up with herself.

It seemed like they had all be thrown together in this room because nobody else wanted to be with them. Marley because she had these random outbursts of power, Teagan because some of her dupes were super frickin annoying, and Marley was convinced that Zac was just so obnoxious that nobody could handle him for more than a few minutes at a time.

Marley watched Teagan and Zac interact when she had realized that there was another little Tegan running around the room again. And by running around the room she meant sneaking up on Zac. And Marley wasn't about to give him any hints on what was about to happen. Just in case the flashlight hitting him in the face wasn't enough.

[Zac Stanson]

Marley glowed at night? It was news to Zac. "You glow?! Since when? How have I never seen you glow before?" That sounds like something you should probably know about your roommate. Ah well. They hadn't been roommates for long. Besides, Zac was pretty sure neither of them even knew what his power was, so be shouldn't really be surprised.

"No, I wasn't kicked out. I requested it. I had an Ergo, Hydro and Pyro in my room, and none of them were in control. Yep. I would come in and there would be glass all over the floor and everything would be soaking wet or melted or charred. So I got moved here." He actually didn't really mind the three boys he had had as roommates, but when they broke his guitar that time, he had to leave. Otherwise there might have only been one person in the dorm in the morning.

Zac realised that both the girls were shining their torches straight at him. It was kind of unnerving. If he had a better memory, he would've remembered Teagan's duplicating. But instead he just sat there as the room went quiet, wondering why two girls were shining lights in his eyes looking sort of through him.
Suddenly Zac felt hands on his shoulders and jumped up from his chair. "Jesus Christ!" Zac shouted. "Can you keep your duplicates controlled? That scared the shit out of me." As he calmed down, he started to see the funny side and smirked. "Seriously, though. Never again."

[Teagan Rae Brooks]

"I was really sure you were kicked out," Teagan told Zac, a slight joking tone in her voice. "But I guess that's a bit much...all of those people in one room. What's your power anyway?" She'd never seen him in action and honestly, she wasn't sure what kind of power she pegged him for. She scrutinized him for a minute, wrinkling her nose as she shined the flashlight on him.

"Honestly, Marley, I can sleep through anything. Even Zac's snoring," she said with a laugh. She'd always been that heavy sleeper that you didn't want to try and wake up.

She was happy when Marley didn't give away what her duplicate was about to do and only shrugged, trying to contain her laughter, when Zac told her she needed to control her duplicates. "No, actually, I can't. I need a trainer first. The dupes do what they want." She liked how he could at least see the funny side of things, given away by the smirk on his face.

[Marley Rose]

Marley had to admit, as much as Teagan's duplicates annoyed the crap out of her, the devious ones were fun. Especially when they were torturing Zac. She shrugged when they questioned her glowing, and claimed that it didn't bother them. At least Teagan wasn't as bitchy as the girls in the other room. Although that almost made it less appealing for Marley to attempt social contact. What was the fun in talking to somebody if they were so agreeable?

Then Teagan brought up Zac's power. "Yeah what do you do?" Marley asked, eyes narrowing, still in disbelief that he hadn't shown them yet - even accidentally. With how out of control some kids were, their powers were often the first thing you notice. It's hard to ignore students who randomly turn into lizards in the hallway, or shoot fire out of their nose when they sneeze too close to a candle. The same way you automatically knew Marley had something to do with electricity the way her hair stood on end and sometimes sparked. Or the way she occasionally shocked people when they came too close.

[Zac Stanson]

Checking behind himself (just in case Teagan had duped again), Zac sat back down in his chair. He grinned again. "Oi, I don't snore! It's just deep breathing, is all."

When they brought up his power, Zac's smile turned into a devious one. That was his little secret that those two didn't know about. Unfortunately, the secret wasn't as good as the reveal, so he had no choice but to tell them. Or show them, if they were lucky.

"So basically, whenever I touch something I turn into it. Well. Not whenever, but a lot of the time. It's all about controlling it and not letting it see pup your body or some shit. Anyway. Say, for example, I touched this torch, I might turn into rubber." Right on cue, Zac's hand turned black. "Or other times, like now, just my hand might turn into rubber. And there's no telling when it's gonna wear off, but it should be pretty soon. And I can't change into liquids or gases, it's only solids. Otherwise I'd be swishing around like a puddle with no way to get back together. And that would suck."

"Happy now?"

[Teagan Rae Brooks]

Teagan grinned to herself, her sleeve going to her mouth instantly to cover the smirk on her lips. She was deeply amused with how her dupe had startled Zac. They were good for something, even if they did cause a lot of trouble that Teagan didn't approve of. This; however, she did.

"What do you call that anyway?" she asked him when he finished explaining his power. "It's just objects, not people? And you know, it's a damn shame you don't turn into liquids, because I wanted to throw a bucket of water on you and see you melt into a puddle." The idea only amused her further.

She wasn't sure if Marley liked her, but she was sure she'd scored some points by scaring Zac, right?