Eye of the tiger, fist of a...flower? [open]

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

Laurie was never someone who'd go out to the gym to hit a punching bag. That was more of Josh's thing (or what she had assumed was his thing. She's not so sure anymore, and not just because he isn't here right now). But since she hasn't heard about the warfare training yet, and the entire situation beforehand with the bombs put her on edge, she needs to do something to work out her emotions.

And beating a punching bag in the sensoriums it is. She's dressed in shorts and tank-top and tennis shoes, wearing sensorium-edition boxing gloves. There's a punching bag hanging from the ceiling, inside a generic kind of gym she'd turned the sensoriums into.

Her ponytail swings when she hops on one foot, raising her gloved hands, ready to throw a punch.

Comments

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

Physical activity to de-stress was a popular pastime lately, it seemed.

Axl wasn't really surprised to walk in on someone else getting their frustrations out in the sensoriums, with everything that had just happened. He was a little surprised, however, when he realized he'd just walked in on Laurie. She hadn't really struck him as the type to unwind by hitting things.

He could've just turned around, quietly walked out, and come back to get his own relaxation-through-property-destruction game on later, but he was wondering how she was doing. (If she was hitting stuff, his guess was "not so hot," all things considered.) And he did like --

-- uh, like talking to her, that was all! (Robot boys are apparently no less stupid about these things than human boys are, at least in Axl's world.)

"Hey, uh, sorry to interrupt, but." But what. Uh. "How're you doing?"

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

(http://photobucket.com)

When she hears Axl's voice, she whirs around, a little high-strung - "Wha!?" - until she sees who it really is. She calms down, breathing in and out, before saying, "Oh, hi, Axl. Umm...I'm doing good."

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Sorry if I surprised you!" he said quickly. "You'd think Stacy would have, like...I dunno. Occupied/Vacant signs on these things or something. So, I mean, if you're busy, I can take off, but I just...thought I'd ask. It's been kind of a crazy week and all that."

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"Yea it has," she says a little quietly, rubbing her arm with her gloved-hand anxiously. "It's OK. I'm not busy..." in many senses. She'd been standing there ready to throw a punch for five minutes before Axl walked in.

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"I didn't know you boxed."

He was guessing she didn't box, but it seemed like a better thing to say than man, I totally never saw you as the boxing type.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"I don't," she quickly says. "Um, I was just trying it out. For the first time. Warfare training hasn't been announced yet, and I just wanted to keep up my training." She taps one of her gloves hands against the punching bag. It doesn't even move.

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, that makes sense. I've been kind of slacking off on melee stuff lately. I guess I should work on it more, but..." He shrugs. "I dunno, it's not really the same without Zero around to beat it into me."

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"Yea," Laurie solemnly says. "I miss training with the New Mutants. I was really comfortable training with my friends."

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Yeah. I mean, I guess the logical solution is just 'so make new friends,' but..." He shrugs again. "Putting it that way makes people sound kinda...replaceable, or something. I dunno. Nothing against anyone I've met here, I like you guys, but..."

But it's not quite the same.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

Laurie looks at her feet glumly for a moment. She'd never thought of it that way. "I guess it is..." She weakly smiles at his explanation, or at least attempt of an explanation. "It's all right. I get what you mean."

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Ugh, sorry, this got way more depressing than I meant it to." Axl wrinkled his nose.

correct icon this time

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"It's OK," she says, trying to not sound so quiet.

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"I'll make it up to you later!"

He has no idea how he plans on doing that. It just kind of slipped out. But surely he can think of something awesome and cheery to do sometime when the recent tragedies aren't quite so fresh on everyone's minds.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"Huh?" she looks up, surprised, and cheeks flushing at the implication. "For me? Y-you don't really have to do that."

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Well, I may not have to, but I want to, so it works out fine, right?"

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"Sure..." She's feeling much better now. "So, um, what did you want to do?"

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"To be honest? I hadn't quite figured that out yet." He grins sheepishly. "So I guess the big question is -- what makes you happy?"

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"Oh um. I like...reading, puzzles, movies, writing, and..." She then realizes that only two of those things are things she could do with another person. "...I like video games."

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

Axl perks up a bit at that last bit. "I love video games! We can totally work with that."

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

(http://photobucket.com)

All right. So maybe video games are more of her ex-boyfriend, Josh's, expertise. Or, were, since he isn't here right now (and she kind of doesn't want to think of that.) But video games are a generic favorite among boys - and apparently so, since Axl seems really excited about the idea, and she doesn't want to disappoint him - so she goes with it. "OK. What kind of games?"

...an actual IC excuse for the DDR icon, whooooa

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

Hm. She doesn't really seem like a shooter type. Fighting games? He's not really so sure about that one either.

But come to think of it, the first time he talked to her was at that dance club on Zokez II, so maybe the best way to go was --

"Have you ever played rhythm games at all?"

awesome~

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"I think DDR...once..." Maybe? Perhaps?

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Up for trying again?" But then he adds, "I mean, if you hated it or anything, we can totally think of something else. It's all cool with me."

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"No, it's OK," she quickly says. "I can always give it another try...and it's good to try again on things."


[ooc: going to sleep. night.]

[gunslinging.livejournal.com]

"Yeah. No way to get better without trying stuff again." Which was what he usually told himself every time Zero beat the snot out of him in melee training. Someday he'd give as good as he got. Someday.

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"Hi Laurie." Sofia tried to smile brightly at her friend, although the events of before had dampened her spirits. But that was even more reason to try to cheer up her friends.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

Laurie whirrs around on her heel when she hears Sofia's voice. She hasn't seen her friend in a while, and she'd started to worry a bit. "Sofia!" she says aloud, rushing to her friend and pulling Sofia into a hug. "I've missed you!"

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"I missed you too." Sofia returned Laurie's hug. "I'm sorry I didn't come see you right away. I had to think some things over." And then grieve in private. She hadn't known the people who died, but their loss- especially the loss of Cassie, the same age as most of her friends- still affected her.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

(http://photobucket.com)

Laurie still stays in Sofia's arms - after all, she hasn't seen her friend in a considerably long time - but she pulls away a little so there's more breathing room between them.

"What were you thinking about? Oh, wait. You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"A lot of things." Sofia didn't pull away from Laurie. Any time she held her it was hard to let go. Even after all this time it was impossible not to think about how she had lost her. "The deaths and... I don't know if it's right to talk about it. After what happened with Shiva and the people who died it seems... small." A pause to search for the right word. "Trivial."

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"If you don't want to talk about it, you don't have to," Laurie reasons.

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"I..." Sofia sighed. "I... think I should. I..." Oh, she needed to just stop making excuses. "I slept with Julian." There, she said it. "We were both a little drunk at the time."

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

After a few seconds of staring with a very shocked and surprised face (not to mention mildly disturbed somewhere along the line) Laurie finally said something: "Oh."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

The funny thing was, Sofia's reaction to it hadn't been that different from Laurie's.

"...Yes..." Sofia wasn't usually shy at all but she suddenly couldn't think of what to say. Or to do more than sneak glances at her friend.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"...are you okay?" She really doesn't know what else to say to Sofia's statement.

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"I don't know." Sofia admitted.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

Laurie looks away briefly. "Oh." There is an awkward feeling settling in the air that Laurie didn't really want to acknowledge. Sofia's her friend. They can get past this awkwardness. "Do you not want to talk about it?"

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"I don't know." She repeated. "I don't know what I should do." Wait... was she asking for Laurie's advice on love?

Oh how the tides have turned.

[terribly2shy.livejournal.com]

"Well...I can't really say something about Julian...but I can say that I know that you care about him..."