Technophobia (Robbie!)

[Reeve Rzeznik]

It was only a few more days until the school year started up again, and Reeve Rzeznik was bored. Much to his dismay, even though it seemed like every day he was becoming less connected to the non-technology world, and felt as if true feeling was getting harder and harder to come by, little annoying things like boredom and mild irritation were still as easy as ever to feel, and today, Reeve felt them both in spades. As rare as they were, he did have days where there was nothing on the internet that could entertain him, and he didn't have the patience or the motivation to code up a site of his own for a moment's entertainment. And so, instead of cooping himself up in his room, Reeve decided to take a bit of a wander throughout Hammel.

The adventure didn't exactly last too long, however, as he found himself entering the Hammel student lounge. The door opened and Reeve took in all the fun little activities available: Television, arcade games, pinball machines, and more. Reeve grinned, as a true sense of mirth engaged him. His eyes kept wandering to the arcade machines, as he had never before gotten a chance to visit a real arcade. He stepped in front of the cabinets, pacing back and forth in front of them. There were so many, from fighting games to racing games to shoot-em-ups, and Reeve could not for the life of him decide what he wanted to play first.

After about the fifth pace, it struck him. Why not play them all?

And so, with a grin, Reeve reclined back on one of the comfiest looking chairs he could find, closed his eyes, and established a link with the arcade games, one at a time. Usually, for harder work, Reeve would have to speak to the machines, or at least be closer in proximity, but to just use them at face value, like any other person would, required less effort on his part. Once he connected, he began to play, partitioning off separate streams of consciousness to allow him to play all the game simultaneously. He found that such a task was, actually, exceedingly difficult, and wanted some background noise to help him focus.

Thus, if anyone were to walk into the room, the first thing they'd see would be a young blonde boy sitting in a couch, staring intently at the TV as it clicked rapidly through channels, and all of the arcade cabinets lit up and chiming off as they were all being played simultaneously -- and surprisingly, fairly decently, at that.

[Robbie Wilkes]

The holidays were drawing close and Robbie couldn't help but feel intensely restless. With no one back from home, the dorm had been quieter than normal and he did not like it one bit. He even contemplated on tampering with his powers at one point of time in his boredom. He had leveled up in practically half of his games and completed the other half in the mere weeks that he didn't have anywhere to go but his cot in his room. Even the internet didn't appeal to him so much.

He had possibly ventured Hammel and covered every inch of the school compound and found nothing entertaining. He even went to the library. To read. What Professor Dalton would do if he were to see him right then. It would be chaos. Or laughter. Robbie chose the latter in his mind.

So deciding he really didn't have that much choice in the matter, he went to the student lounge to watch some TV only to find practically every piece of equipment in the room was switched on. He had to do a double take and also a full search of the room only to find one person settled in front of the TV as it switched channels. But the boy didn't even have a remote control in his hand.

"What the..." Robbie flipped through what little memory capacity he had for information until he settled on the fact that this boy was either telekinetic or technopathic. Either way, Robbie decided that was cool enough for him to pounce on and maybe he could even entertain him somewhat.

He looked around to see who it was and found that it was Reeve Rzeznik, a technopath he had bumped into a couple of times before. "Dude!" Robbie exclaimed, not knowing what the sudden noise could do to the other boy's concentration and the link he had with the machines around him. "I thought everyone went home. Did you go home?" The blond weather manipulator asked of his casual acquaintance.

[Reeve Rzeznik]

At the sudden outburst of 'Dude!' Reeve blinked, and the television skitzed out for half a second, and his little ship blew up in the shoot-em-up game. He jumped a little, clearly startled. More than he'd like to admit, focusing on all the separate tasks at once wasn't particularly easy, and the sudden speech had shattered his thoughts. He'd managed to retain his grip on the television, but the arcade games were another matter. Even as Robbie was continuing to speak, Reeve sat up straighter, trying to salvage his games, but with the mental partitions broken, everything was a hodgepodge of code, sound effects, and flashing lights.

"No, not that, unngh," Reeve grunted as he tried to uppercut the opposing car and punch the Nitrous Oxide on his Ryu. "Wait, no, I got this... DAMN!" almost poetically, he found himself losing all of his other games simultaneously, and with a frustrated wave of his hand, sent them all back to the start screen.

Reeve shook his head, looking back up at the boy who'd startled him. He recognized the face, but his name eluded him. "Oh, hey," he began, politely enough. For the life of him, however, he could not remember the boy's name.

"You're, uh..." Reeve paused, and looked as if he was simply trying to put a name to a face that was sitting just on the tip of his tongue. Likely unknown to the weather manipulator, though, he was actually using the school's wireless internet to access the Hammel student directory, until he found a name that sounded correct.

"Robbie, right?" he asked, getting it in one. "Sorry about, well, all that," he apologized, sweeping a hand out across the room to denote what he was saying sorry for. "You were saying...?"

[Robbie Wilkes]

When the other boy started to spaz out, talking to himself as every piece of equipment in the lounge showed defeat over and over again, Robbie actually managed to connect the dots, his mouth gaping open in understanding. He had just made the technopath lose concentration. Oh jeez. Him and his big mouth.

Well at least the boy didn't start shouting at him as a lot of people usually do when Robbie messed something up of theirs. Robbie looked on as the other boy seemed to blank out, with only his eyes moving from left to right at nothing in particular, rapidly. Robbie raised an eyebrow just as the boy finally blinked and looked up at him, mentioning his name.

"Yuh, Robbie. It's cool dude." Robbie shrugged away the apology before practically canon-balling on to the couch beside Reeve. With his feet propped up on the table in front of them and his hands curled up over his stomach, Robbie investigated the room as the machines hummed in inactivity. "So," he drawled out the one syllable as his eyes turned back to the boy beside him. "Whatcha doin'?"

[Reeve Rzeznik]

"Well, not so much, anymore," Reeve intoned in reply, with a hint of teasing and maybe a smidge of displeasure over the fact. When Robbie had leapt over the back of the couch, Reeve had, almost (but not quite fully) unintentionally scooted a little bit away from the boy, just as much to give him room for his leap as to put a bit more space between the two of them.

With a sigh, Reeve rested his head back against the back of the couch, sparing a glance back over to Robbie for a moment. From his few dealings with the boy, he always seemed to be adventurous and full of life. These weren't usually the kinds of people that Reeve found he could deal with for extended periods of time, but Robbie had a way of tempering his edge around less exuberant types, which had, at the very least, endeared Reeve to the idea of at least sitting around him occasionally. He offered a little empty smile Robbie's way.

"You ever have those days where, no matter what there is to do, none of it sounds worth doing? I'm stuck in one of those. To be honest with you, not even playing six different video games at once was really piquing my interest."

Reeve shrugged nonchalantly and turned his attention back to the television set. In truth, he could probably break this boredom trance by going back into his room and building something. He hadn't really tinkered much since he'd come to Hammel, slightly afraid of what the higher-ups would say if he were to, say, construct a laser gun or something similar. A lingering voice in the back of his head, however, told him it'd be far better to attempt to stay out and socialize, rather than lock himself back up in his room again.

"Did yoooou," Reeve drawled out the 'you' for half a second longer than the average person would say it, trying to find the right words to follow up, "Wanna watch TV or something?" he asked finally. To accentuate the question, he snapped his fingers at the TV set a few times, each time flipping the channel up one. "I might be able to get the extra movie channels they don't subscribe to," he added with a little conspiratorial wink.

[Robbie Wilkes]

Robbie laughed at the other boy's answer. "Sorry," he cheekily shrugged. He lifted his sneakered feet up the couch and wrapped his arm around them, making him look even younger than he was. Robbie had no sense of personal space which was why it was so glaringly obvious when Reeve moved to make space for him.

He was about to open his mouth to fill the silence when Reeve sighed and did it for him by asking him a question that actually related quite well to him. And Reeve mentioning the six games reminded Robbie of what he wanted to say earlier. "Dude! That's crazy awesome. That shoulda made your head 'asplode." Robbie gesticulated wildly with his hands over his head.

"No, I don't really like watching TV. All they have is what the girls like. Some thing with gossipy girls and doctors without boundaries and whatnot. I'm game for some pool if you are. Been playing with myself the past few weeks coz I thought nobody was around. Now you get the honor of entertaining me." Robbie deliberately ignored the wink. After the other day with Zac and Ann and how practically half the conversation was spent talking about porn [Estelle brought him up to speed about Zac's subtle hints], Robbie vowed never to talk about it to anyone.

"Unless there's some black and white movie channels that you can get. Those have got the best gun action."

[Reeve Rzeznik]

"It nearly did," Reeve said with a distant chuckle. "Make my head explode, that is." He let the words hang with a little shrug. Whether or not that was actually true was a different matter, but one thing was for certain, when his mental partitions broke down and he couldn't separate one from another, he certainly felt the strain from trying to pull it off. For half a second, he gritted his teeth and rubbed his temples, unintentionally lending a bit more credence to the half-joke than he'd really meant to. The sudden spike of pain he'd felt was fleeting, likely more a figment of his imagination from actually thinking about it rather than any real ache, and before he'd even really started rubbing his head, it was gone. With that finished, Reeve plopped himself back into the comfort of the chair, watching an infomercial and passively wondering who played infomercials in the middle of the afternoon as Robbie began to talk again.

Reeve grimaced a little and scratched the back left side of his head upon Robbie's mention of shows only girls liked, agreeing in full but not wanting to cut him off to say so. It had certainly seemed from his cursory examination of the subscribed channels that there was a heavy catering to those of the female persuasion. Reeve, who generally didn't care for TV in the first place, had been particularly unimpressed by this, which was why he just watched whatever TV he wanted on the internet in his room.

The suggestion to play pool, however, didn't sound quite so welcoming. Reeve had an understanding of the game, as most did, but he had rarely ever played himself. Worse yet, there was nothing in pool he could control to his advantage, the entire game was played without computers of any sort. Even so, Robbie seemed so insistent that Reeve knew it would be very impolite to turn him down. And so, masking his dissatisfaction well, Reeve turned to Robbie and nodded agreeably, punctuating it with another little shrug. "Sounds good to me, man."

With that, Reeve stood up, looking over at the pool tables as an impending sense of dread overtook him. "And if you're looking for gunfights..." Reeve bit his lip and did a little mental double-check, and with a quiet little utterance of binary code, a rapid-fire vocal burst of ones and zeros that Robbie likely wouldn't have understood if he'd even heard it, the TV switched over to a previously-unsubscribed network where an uncensored version of Robert Rodriguez's film Desperado was playing. "Check this out. Dude walks into a bar with a guitar case, opens it up, it's full of guns and he just blows the whole place away."

As the movie played, Reeve walked over to the pool table and put his hands on the edges, halfway hoping that, somehow, he could pull some sort of signal from it, but no luck. His back to Robbie, he let a frown slip across his face for the span of a few moments before wiping it clean.

[Robbie Wilkes]

Robbie laughed at Reeve's answer before noticing the wince, to which he laughed even more, simply thinking the other boy was playing around. His acquiescence in playing pool was met with enthusiasm on Robbie's part and complete lack of awareness of the hesitance and lack of enthusiasm on Reeve's part. He was just glad he could finally test out the pool table with someone else besides himself.

When the TV clicked on to "Desperado", Robbie turned to it in amazement, still having not gotten over his friend's powers. It was a little scary since Robbie was a little bit of a technophobe and knows nothing of the TV beyond it being the portal to video games galore and the internet was just a way to get in contact with his other friends from the outside world.

"Dude, that's my favourite movie!" Robbie commented as he walked backwards to the pool table, his eyes glued to the screen. It took him awhile to actually arrive at the pool table due to the things he fell over, walking backwards like that. You would think after falling over your own feet, Robbie would be smart enough to turn around and rush to pool table to continue watching the movie.

He carelessly set up the table and grabbed two sticks from behind him, throwing one haphazardly in Reeve's general direction. "I can't decide if I wanna continue with the movie or play pool." He mumbled as he painfully tore his eyes away from the screen to concentrate on pool. He stole glances at the TV, unknowingly revealing to Reeve the one thing that might give him a shot in winning.

Robbie was obviously easily distracted. People took advantage of it and Robbie was none the wiser. He was the poster child for lost causes.

"Okay, so you wanna play by color or by shot?" He asked, not even aware that the boy might not understand what he meant by playing by color or shot. In Robbie logic: playing by color is to decide who gets the stripes and who gets the full colored ones, while playing by shot just meant whoever gets to pocket the first ball will have to pocket the same ones throughout the game.

They weren't the actual rules but it wasn't like they were going to win any tournaments any time soon so...

[Reeve Rzeznik]

Reeve looked over his shoulder, offering a little smile as Robbie exclaimed that Desperado was his favorite. It was as fake as most of Reeve's expressions, but this conversation was a simple one: Two boys were talking about things they liked, and Reeve had hit the nail on the head with his suggestion. Of course, not only would he be pleased with himself at the moment, he'd also, potentially, be glad to know that Robbie approved. Thus, the situation deserved a small grin: Nothing too overtly obnoxious, as Reeve hadn't really developed that kind of reputation around Hammel, but nothing too meek, either.

"Yeah, it's pretty good. It's not my favorite, but I enjoy it." Reeve shrugged, stopping to consider it for a moment. "I don't even think I have a favorite movie," he confessed after his pause.

As he spoke, Reeve had turned around and sat against the side of the pool table, turning just in time to see Robbie tripping over the couch as he attempted to watch the movie and make his way to the pool table all at once. The sight was obviously supposed to be amusing to the young technopath, and so he put on his face as required: His grin widened a little as a slight chuckle escaped his lips.

"You're going to love walking, when you learn how," he quipped slightly, deciding to further his act by adding a joke to it. When Robbie finally got the pool table, Reeve shrugged in response to his slight dilemma. "Well, I mean, we're already here, so..."

He let the idea hang in the air as he caught the pool cue, fumbling it only a bit, having to bat it from the air with one hand and catch it with the other, his eyes widening ever-so-slighty in perfectly-designed shock and worry. In truth, he had been a little worried about dropping it, but he knew better than to think that dropping it would have had any real effect on anything: The cue would have been fine, the table wouldn't have been scratched, and even if it had hit Robbie, he wouldn't have been anything but amused by it. Even so, such a surprise would have registered to most people, and so Reeve did as he knew was right.

"Let's just play by shot," Reeve decided, walking around to the other side of the table to get the multi-colored balls and the triangle, putting them all up in perfect alignment after a quick mental Google-search on how to do so. "How does the saying go? I'll rack 'em, and you crack 'em?" he asked with a shrug and a little laugh, basically offering Robbie the chance to break.

[Robbie Wilkes]

"That's sad," Robbie commented on Reeve's lack of a favourite movie. "But that just means you haven't seen the good ones yet." The blond shrugged with a smile. It was amusing how different these two boys were in their handling their emotions. One had to pretend having them while the other had to control his.

Although if Robbie were to have been asked, he would say they had something in common. They could never actually show their true emotions. For Robbie, it was a matter of national security. If he were to let loose, who knows what could happen to the world. Drought, hailstorms, thunderstorms, what have you. For Reeve, his lack of actual emotion mostly had to do with his inability to separate himself from the machines.

They were, within reason, kindred spirits.

Robbie laughed at Reeve's poke at his clumsiness. "Oh gee thanks for all your help too."

"Okay this is a little too distracting." Robbie scratched the back of his head before going to the TV and switching it off. Looking around, he finally found the stereo and pressed play. Some shit music by a screechy girl filled the room and he quickly slapped the stop button repeatedly. He laughed to himself before fiddling with the buttons, giving up half way and turned to Reeve. "Dude...uh do you mind I dunno...using your Jedi tricks to get some decent music up in here?"

Robbie went back to the pool table and nodded at the chance to start the game off. "Okies, just get some good tunes going." He tapped the white ball on the board a couple times before angling his cue stick just so, hitting the ball hard. The balls went in every different direction and one striped ball dropped down into the top left hand corner. "Score!" His luck didn't last the second time round but he was just glad he got it first time round.

[Reeve Rzeznik]

Reeve just shrugged at the initial remark. "I've seen a bunch of movies, I just... don't know which ones I like more than the others. I guess I like them all for separate reasons, really." He shrugged again, unsure of how else to gesture with such a statement. This time the shrug was a bit more pronounced, holding the pool cue with one hand while raising the other up somewhat, turning his palm up to give a bit more to it than just a simple shoulder raise.

Reeve chuckled, both at Robbie's comment about his own joke, and the decision to change the station. "What? I thought this was your favorite movie," he heckled a bit more, albeit good-naturedly. As Robbie went for the stereo, though, Reeve's good-natured grin faded into one of disgust.

His frown creased his whole face as the screechy girl assaulted his eardrums, and as Robbie fumbled for the stop button, Reeve went ahead and quietly helped him out, sending a quick request to the stereo to please, by all means, just shut the fuck up and stop trying to attempt murder by music. Considering he'd already used his powers once to actually stop the thing, he didn't mind using them again to put something better on. There was a moment's hesitation, as, with his power, it was no problem at all to re-route the stereo into an internet radio station to play whatever it was he wanted, and so it was simply a matter of what to play. He considered putting some of his personal favorite music on a playlist, but decided against it, since most people didn't care for the trance and orchestral rock he usually preferred.

Instead, he decided to put on a more contemporary rock song and looked back to Robbie. "How's that? I'd say it's better than whatever the hell that was," he shook his head. "Whatever the hell that was," he concluded, looking back down to the table.

"My turn?" he asked, noting that Robbie had taken his shots and was now seeming to wait for Reeve. For his part, Reeve walked around to look at the pocketed balls, finding a single striped ball in the depository. "Solids? Cool."

Reeve took aim at the nearest solid, lined up his cue, and took a shot. He missed. "Crap."

[Robbie Wilkes]

"Oh," Robbie drawled at Reeve's response. He supposed it made sense. People have other interests and don't usually concentrate on one thing and one thing alone. It did make it hard for Robbie to continue with that line of interest though. He may spout off his favourite quotes from his most loved movies and Reeve might not have the same enthusiasm in hearing it. He might not even know what Robbie was talking about.

Even Robbie noticed Reeve's pure dislike and was glad the screechy sounds was replaced by silence when he hit the stop button. That was a relief. When Reeve did his Jedi thing on the stereo and heavy beats filled the room, Robbie shrugged. "Better than the one before for sure. I'm not too fussy." He grinned at his companion and nodded when he was asked if it was his turn.

He didn't manage to pocket anything which Robbie noted with a slight nod. For all he knew, Reeve was just waiting to hustle him but even if that was the other boy's angle, Robbie was just glad the boy was up for playing at all. Yes, Robbie had become needy the past few days and it sucked.

Robbie chewed on his lower lip as he decided on his next move, one hand knocking the cue stick on the carpeted floor out of habit while the other hand played with the white ball he had picked up. Finally finding a perfect hit, he managed to pocket two balls simultaneously in the middle pocket and right hand corner. His next move brought up zilch so it was Reeve's turn.

"So how'd Hammel find you?" Robbie asked, mostly out of curiosity.

[Reeve Rzeznik]

"I'm guessing it wasn't for my stellar skill at billiards," Reeve offered with a lazy grin, leaning over the table and striking the cue ball towards the nearest solid. It rolled near the corner pocket, but did not go in. Reeve shook his head and snapped his fingers in consternation. He wasn't hustling anyone, he was just legitimately not skilled at pool. However, even as he was playing, he was starting to look at the playing field, and his eyes monitored all of Robbie's shots, taking in his stance, his hand position, his angles...

Reeve did his best to attempt to use his machine-like mind to his advantage, and understand the cold, hard math of the game.

"My parents sent me here, actually," he continued, more honestly this time. As he spoke, he took a step back, leaning against the nearby wall to watch Robbie take his turn. He held the stick upright, rubber end against the floor, both hands near the top, and glanced over it at the blonde boy at the table. "They're meta-people too. The second I started cracking passwords by accident, they realized there was something different and hucked me off to their alma mater."

[Robbie Wilkes]

A small chuckle emitted from Robbie in response to Reeve's dry humor. Robbie's light blue eyes followed the white ball as it hit a solid, seeing it roll down so close to the pocket but not dropping. Wincing, he went over to where the cue ball was and bent over just slightly, positioning his cue stick before striking it but not getting a ball pocketed. "Poop." He mumbled before looking up as Reeve explained how he got here.

"Really? Both your parents?" Robbie's eyes gleamed. Man, what it would be like to have parents who don't look at you differently because they themselves were different. "So are they like you? Can they also control machines and stuff?" Robbie asked, genuinely interested. "Or are they like, completely different than you?"

As much as Robbie hated having too much emotion boiling in him, sometimes it just bubbles up at the most inopportune time. It's a good thing he had a semblance of control over his powers as he was getting a hang of regulating his emotions. Which was why thunder didnt rumble in the distance as he thought of his parents miles away from him thinking he was a complete freak.