10197/Hearts and Minds

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Hearts and Minds
Date of Scene: 26 November 2019
Location: Lobby, Titans Tower
Synopsis: It finally comes to a head when Stardust and Volt have a very long talk about his uncertain involvement with the Titans. Herein origins are discussed, and Volt lays out what he believes and how he came to be who - and what - he is today.
Cast of Characters: Volt, Stardust




Volt has posed:
Early evening has set in, and the sun has set in the distance. Drake - or perhaps better known here as Volt - hasn't been back in the Tower long after an outing. But he hasn't bothered to ascend the tower yet. Instead, he turned to take a seat in the lobby near the elevator. The Titans communicator is retrieved from his pocket, and he begins rotating it in his hand, slowly between fingers, eyeing it quietly. He's not hitting any buttons; simply examining it while his mind trails over things.

What's been said.

What he's observed.

Options.

He's made no effort to get a costume made up. As he'd mentioned before, he hasn't taken anything per diem. He's spent most of his time either in the Danger Room, or in his temporary abode.

Stardust has posed:
    Colette's day has been interesting to say the least, and she's not in the best of moods. First there was the hole thing of being hit by a powerful wave of dark magic that caused the 967 entities living in her brain to start arguing with each other, which caused a headache that has yet to fade. Returning to the tower to recuperate, she took a bike out for a nice relaxing drive around the island and managed to crash it into the tree. A stormcloud follows her as she wheels it into the lobby to take down to the vehicle bay for repairs.

    With all this on her mind, Colette is half way across the lobby before she notices Drake there. She tilts her head curiously, then leans the bike against a wall and starts to walk over. The bike almost immediately slides to the floor with a crash. She turns to look back at it, sighs, shrugs, and decides to ignore it for now. Instead she goes over and takes a seat by Drake.

    "Hey," she says, a somewhat restrained greeting. "Trying to figure out the T-Com? You'd do better if you were concentrating, I'm pretty sure you're not." She pauses a few moments. "Something up? Wanna talk about it?"

Volt has posed:
"I'm not. I'm considering leavin' it," Volt replies bluntly. He sets the device on the arm of the chair, not back in his pocket, and he redirects his gaze to Colette. ...And then promptly to the bike. Leaning over, he squints past her at the damaged vehicle. "It looks like you have some other things to deal with," he concludes before leaning back again. "Thanks for the offer. But that... that might explode or something."

After a beat, he clarifies, "I know how to jack rides, not so much about fixing'em."

Stardust has posed:
    Colette raises an eyebrow at Volt, and holds her silence for a few moments. She glances back at the bike and gives another, more obvious shrug. "It's only a bike," she says. "There are more important things in the world. Like people."

    She leans back in her seat, staring up at the ceiling. "I'm not exactly hot on fixing vehicles either. I think I just bent something though, I can probably bend it back. Um. I mean before I just dropped it. Hopefully nothing was worse. But as I say, I'm not much for fixing vehicles. So how about you tell me your problem and I'll see if that's something I'm less incompetent with? Maybe I can help out."

Volt has posed:
Volt's lips twist a little, caught out. He looks again to the communicator to pick it up, then back to her. "I think my idea of what a superhero is - or should be - doesn't really line up with what you guys have here. And I know I came to you guys, and I regret the /Hell/ out of doing that. Would've been way better to meet you on the field. And I know I didn't have all the... y'know, /trappings/ to make me look legit."

He rotates the device again slowly.

"But like you said, the costume doesn't make the hero. The actions do. The way the person acts. What they do. How they are. What they're willing to do."

Stardust has posed:
    Colette thinks about this for a while, then nods her head. "Good," she says finally. "I think... if you thought everything was fine here, I'd be worried. But I don't think that's got anything to do with you coming here rather than meeting us in the field. I think the problem there is with us."

    She turns back to him, studying his face carefully. "But that's not all of it, is it? Because the way you say it, it sounds like you're doubting yourself. I mean what you just said about making yourself look legit. And the thing about in the field makes it sound like you're worried about proving yourself. So. Which is it? What's the discussion we need to have here... the problems that you're facing, or the problems that we are? Because I think both of those are conversations that need to be had at some point, but I don't know your pace here. What can I do to help?"

Volt has posed:
Volt clicks his tongue and lifts his left hand briefly. "You're right, it's not the only thing. But it's not that I'm doubting myself. It's that /you/ doubt /me/." He pauses a moment before continuing. "I'm gonna tell you about myself. The real me. The me you should've met. And I'm not doing this so try to one-up anyone here. Just, maybe you'll get it after you've heard everything."

His vibrant emerald gaze returns to the communicator as it turns slowly between his fingers.

"When I was still a kid, things went... weird with my family. I don't know how to describe it. Like- like Stepford-y. And I fell in with a rough crowd. A gang, mostly about my age. Crimes were kept light, but that was our thing. I learned how to light up a car before I even had a learner's permit. There's not a single mechanical lock I can't work through. And security systems, cameras? I already know how I'd enter this building, and what cameras /would/ see me, you wouldn't know it was me. When I need to be, I'm a ghost."

He stops rotating the communicator.

"That's what the gang liked about me. Heck, I even started street fighting. Get some extra cash, get some notice by others hoods. The streets of L.A. make you hard real fast, and before you know it, it feels more like home to ya than where you sleep at night."

He glances aside to her. "You still with me?"

Stardust has posed:
    "No. Stop. " Colette raises a finger. "I mean yes, I'm still with you. But before you go any further, there's something I want to clarify. I don't doubt you. I just don't /know/ you. Which... which. Um." She stares at her own finger and lowers it. "Is why you're telling me this stuff, which is cool. So... carry on."

    "No, wait," Colette interrupts again before Drake has a chance to resume. "There's one thing I do want to make clear. If I'm tough on you, that's because I think you're not wasting my time. Honestly, coming to the tower like you did takes guts and dedication. That actually impressed me. It's just... no, never mind. Later. Carry on."

Volt has posed:
Volt cants his head, eyebrows lifting at her. He opens his mouth to speak, and she adds more! He blinks, clearly filing that for later. But she said to carry on, so he nods. It takes him a moment for his gaze to leave her and return to the communicator, but the rotating resumes.

"See, the thing about it was, I didn't /like/ doing that. Except maybe the fighting. You feel like a real Chad doing that, not gonna lie. But the other stuff? I got so good at it because... no," he pauses, shaking his head. "Not to /impress/ the gang. It's more like showing'em appreciation. They liked having me around. They respected me. We were equals - on the same footing." There's a pause, but he doesn't add more. He segues, instead. "Back home, my parents didn't care. They just wanted me out of sight when important people would show up. My dad, the cop. My mom, the... god, I dunno, debutante? Anyway, they went from always being mad at me, to always being mad at each other, and eventually I just felt more like the gang was my family."

The rotating communicator pauses, and he lifts his head. "Then we did something stupid. We'd just hit these sweet rides, sold'em off to a fence, and were talking about what we were gonna do with it. And one of us - wasn't me, I swear," he adds, side-eyeing Colette, "decided to start tagging an older gang's territory. One that didn't care so much about keeping the crimes morgue-free. They found us. They were armed. We split to try to lose'em. And I got a tail I just couldn't shake. Wound up on the wrong end of a South-side alley, and me staring down the business-end of a steel barrel. He went to make some speech, and I admit it, I freakin' cowered, man. Knees went out, hands went up."

The emerald eyes return to the communicator.

"That's when the lightning came out. It was like a muscle tearing, my palms /hurt/. I heard the sound, saw the light through my eyelids, and when I looked again, that was it. He wasn't moving. You follow?"

Stardust has posed:
    Colette listens in silence. It's hard to judge her reaction - there's the faintest of nods of her head at the line about being equals. The side-eye reveals nothing judgemental, but honestly nothing much at all. It's hard to guess whether she's holding something back or if she's just waiting for him to finish. It's not a face you'd want to see over a poker table.

    When Drake reaches the end and asks if she follows, she nods her head. "The 'body count of one'," she says quietly. She turns to him, looking him right in the eyes, as if trying to see something deep in there. "Yeah, I did catch that. Didn't seem like the right moment to talk about it, though. I guess you saved me the trouble of finding the right time. And... how did that make you feel?"

Volt has posed:
Volt nods in respnose; she did catch his meaning. That's the body count. Her question gets a pause, and his gaze lowers.

"I felt nothing." Beat. "No. That's not right. Not nothing. Numb. Like if you sit on your leg too long. Tingling. Motionless. I couldn't- I couldn't /process/ what just happened. Everything about it was wrong. He came at me, probably to kill me, but I killed him. I /killed/ someone. With /lightning/. In an instant, just half a heartbeat, I was no longer human. But not just... no-longer-human, but a killer. A monster. A terrifying, mythical thing that kids beg their parents to search for beneath their bed."

He's silent for a moment. "It broke me."

He discreetly puts his gaze back on the communicator, haunted. "I couldn't look at myself. I couldn't talk to anyone. I couldn't risk anyone knowing what I was- am. I kept away from my parents. I kept away from the gang. For a while, all I could do was be afraid that I'd do that to someone again. But that turned into something else."

The rotation pauses.

"A need to get better."

He pauses, lips thinning a moment, and the rotating resumes. "I dedicated every day of my life for years honing this power. God, it hurt at first. But I kept at it. I snuck onto football fields late at night to let loose, to test its limits, and every week, it'd be stronger. My reach would be further. The damage would be more severe. But on the other side..."

He pauses to suddenly lift a hand towards Colette's head, never making contact. Unless she shies back or has some measure of defense, she's likely to feel stray folicles of her hair lift. "...I got that fine, miniscule control. I learned to be safe."

The hand withdraws. "I got things to tell me wattage, currents, amps. I learned what the numbers /felt/ like when I pushed'em. I studied what it'd take to kill a person, and I learned the /Hell/ out of what it feels like to keep in a safe range. Because something else happened then, too."

Volt turns a little on his chair, more to face Colette.

"I realized I didn't have to be a monster. I didn't have to be something people feared. I'm different. I'm not human. But I could use that. I could make life better. Like the heroes I'd see on t.v."

Stardust has posed:
    Colette does not shy away from the hand; she's seen some evidence of what Volt can do, but there appears to be know worry. She seems more curious than anything else, whether out of some kind of confidence or out of trust, who can tell. The static effect even gets a small smile from her.

    "I understand," she says finally. "Not because my story is anything like yours. But because I've spent a couple of years on this team, and one thing I've come to realize is that almost everyone who comes here is trying not to be a monster, one way or the other. I mean there's two people on this team who were trained to be monsters and had to break away from that. There is one who literally becomes a wild animal. There is one who was born to be a monster so dreadful she'd rather die than become it. Me, not so much. I'm kind of boring. But I've killed someone too. And unlike you, that wasn't instinctively lashing out when I didn't know my powers. That was cutting someone in half with a sword. The thing that lets me sleep at night is that I know I didn't have a choice. I mean I did literally have a choice, but it wasn't a choice that I... that anyone could afford. If I hadn't... anyway I'll tell you about that another time. This is about you."

    She sits back and takes a deep, deep breath. "Look. None of that was about saying your experiences aren't... unique. Aren't meaningful. Everyone's are, and what you've gone through... is something that is going to change you in all kinds of ways. Not just the powers, but that changes everyone. That's why the Titans /exists/. Oh sure, we save lives, we inspire people, and so on. But so do the Justice League, the Avengers, so on. What's different about is that we're young and inexperienced. All of us. We are here to shape our own destinies, together. And together means sharing those experiences. Sharing the things that shape us. Learning that we're not monsters from each other's examples. It changes us. It's changed me in more ways than I really want to think about, to be honest."

    Colette looks down, blinks a couple of times, and nibbles her lower lip. "Okay. Cards on the table. Titans is not in the best of places right now. It's kind of... a transition, I guess. I hope. Our leader is really busy with... well, Gotham's kind of a mess at the moment. Our second is on extended personal lead. I'm not a leader. I'm not... I just kind of take charge of things, because /someone/ has to, you know? Raven has... well, she's kind of... hard to get through to. Beast Boy has a movie career. Starfire... I don't really know what she's up to these days. Cassie is rarely around. The core of the team is kind of split, and we're not really /being/ a team. Not like we have been in the past. Not like we're capable of being. An for some reason, I can't... I can't just leave that alone."

    "A team makes each other stronger." Coeltte looks up again, and smiles slightly. It's almost an apologetic smile, like she's admitting to something she's done wrong. " Reminds each other that they are not monsters. Gives each other heart. That's why we need people like you, Volt. And like Kian, despite what Robin thinks. Because you two have heart. Everything you've told me, tells me that. So. Forget about the heroes you've seen on TV. That's all fine, and it's great if we inspire people to want to not be monsters that way. But it doesn't come ready mixed. What it really needs is trust and friendship. And that takes time. Time, and heart."

Volt has posed:
Volt doesn't interrupt her, but he looks like he's at all times on the verge. Various moments, little tidbits, see the edges of his nerves spiking. But he's refraining. Whether out of respect, curiosity, or a mix of the two, may not be very clear - but he's holding his peace.

"Yeah. A team does," he says finally. "And that's part of what has me not-so-sure about this. But it's missing a part." A part she came quite close to, but just barely skiffed. "And I can't just- I can't just come right out and say it. You won't get it. I have to explain it."

He starts to turn, but pauses, a troubled look on his face. He turns right back around to Colette. "I'm sorry you had to make that choice," he says. He's pretty sure she knows what he means by that. "I.. really mean that. I've not been in that spot yet. I hope I never am. But I've thought about it. What would happen if it came down to it. I think you have to think about it at some point, to even be able to move. I just... y'know, wanted to get that out there." His head cants meaningfully to her. "Ready for me to give you the rest?"

Stardust has posed:
    "I did it without thinking," Colette says. "I mean we joke about saving the world, but the stakes really were that high. It made me feel sick after." She gives a slight shake of her head. "I mean... I quite quickly figured out that... I didn't feel guilty. Because I /had/ to do it, you know? He basically... well he put himself in a position where either he died or a LOT of other people would. Honestly, what's worse is that I don't have the fine control you do. I punch people, and you can't measure that in volts and amps. So maybe some time, you know. Maybe I punched someone too hard once. I don't know, but it's possible. I mean the odds are it's going to happen some time, right?"

     She draws in a deep, slightly ragged breath. "Sorry. This is your confessional, not mine. Go on, I'm listening." She leans back, composes herself for a moment, then turns back to him, all ears.

Volt has posed:
Hesitantly, Volt lifts a hand towards her to set on her shoulder. He isn't sure if that's taboo or what have you, but he goes for it. And should it land, it'll come with a gentle, reassuring squeeze. "PSI, Star." After a beat, he adds, "Boxers use these things to measure the force of their punch. The PSI. Pounds per square inch." He knows a bit about a wide variety of things, a lot about a very narrow scope of things, and very little about scholastic things. But that's one he knew about. "One of the gang's hideouts was the back area of a gym. We'd sneak in at night and screw around with their stuff."

Withdrawing a little, Volt turns ahead again. And if he'd made contact with her shoulder, now is the time it would slip away. "So, yeah. I thought I could be like the heroes I'd hear about, the ones on the news. But at some point, it dawned on me that all of them could trace back their powers to something specific. I couldn't. Because I wasn't like them. I was like the ones that'd get... like, all the bad press. The ones people hated. At least around where I lived, they hated'em out loud." He inhales, then breathes the word, "Mutant."

His head shakes. "I convinced myself it didn't matter. Heroes, even the ones in training, needed to hide their identity anyway, right? But there was this one night. I guess I was sixteen, maybe? My dad came into my room. He'd been talking to someone, like a therapist, y'know? And he told me things were gonna be different. That our family was gonna get back on track, and things would get better."

His emerald gaze drifts to the communicator again. It begins rotating. "I believed him. I showed him my powers."

The communicator rotates a couple times in silence.

"He told me to never use them again. To never speak of it. That it was wrong. That they'd find a way to fix me. I don't know if I've ever been more... ah, I dunno...," he trails as the rotation slows, gaze faltering. "...whatever, I needed time. I needed to clear my head, to think. So I got dressed and went to sneak out that night. He caught me. Didn't tell me to go back to my room. Just, right there, told me to never come back."

Volt is silent for several seconds this time, staring hard at the communicator. He seems to realize that he'd fallen silent, and quickly adds, "A-anyway, I hitchhiked and stowed away to the only place I could think of where I could find people like myself. Where they always came up on the news. Here. New York. Because I couldn't go back to the gang. I didn't wanna /do/ that stuff anymore, I wanted to be better. To mean something. And the irony is, it wound me up with the dumbest idea ever. I'd use my powers to knock over gas stations, waiting for the right people to notice and get me."

He steals a quick glance to Colette. "I never hurt anyone! And it was all, like, petty cash. I am /not/ proud of this, okay?"

Stardust has posed:
    Colette has no problem with the contact. She even responds to the hand on the shoulder with a smile. She may have mostly seen her doing the tough act so far, but she appreciates his intent, and doesn't have the contact phobia some people do. Hell, she even hugged Raven one, and lived!

    There's another nod of the head when Volt brings up the mutant thing. She'd already assumed that, and briefly asked him about it when he first turned up at the tower. He hadn't felt comfortable answering then, but he's doing so now. For now at least she doesn't comment on that. Volt hasn't been exactly focused on the media lately so he might not know the stance the Titans have taken on the mutant issue, but you don't spend much time in this business without knowing a few mutants. It would be pretty weird for a member of the Titans not to be sympathetic when it comes to that.

    Once he reveals the story of the gas stations, the quick glance he steals reveals something a little surprising. Colette is smiling. She looks down, then up again. Anywhere except straight at Drake. "Wait. You mean... you're telling me that... you knocked over gas stations in the hope that some more experienced supers would spot you, see the potential and put you on the right track? That's..." She makes an odd noise in the back of her throat, then coughs to clear it. "Uh. Volt. That's not... that's..." she makes the noise again, and covers her mouth momentarily with the back of her hand. Her shoulders shake slightly. She clears her throat again. "Oh... ahem. Oh sorry. Sorry Volt. I shouldn't... that's the..." she looks away quickly, shaking her head. It's obvious at this point she's trying really hard not to laugh. "Jeez. I'm sorry. But the... ahem. That's why. Well I can't think of a better illus... Ahem. Illustration of why there needs to be places like.. ahem. This."

Volt has posed:
"Oh, shut up," scathes Volt, but with exactly zero venom. He's even smiling a little back at her, humored. He already said he's not proud of it. "I was desperate, okay?"

He tilts aside to lightly bump his shoulder at her.

"/Anyway/, it actually worked. I mean, kind of. More of a right place at the right time situation. But I was picked up and taken into the Xavier Institute, and man, I was excited, and terrified, and I just couldn't believe it. That place is a /mansion/. Had everything I could possibly want - except for a decent beach."

He pauses to frown. "Nowhere in New York has a decent Cali'-style beach."

Refocusing, Volt leans back in the chair and stares forward. "But then I started to notice things. Everyone was a mutant, yeah, and I should've felt like I belonged. But something was off. The faculty I was around seemed very, /very/ passionate about not hiding what they were. Or more specifically, not hiding what the students were. Publicly. Daring people to attack, daring a jerk to pull a pistol and try to 'fix' the gene pool. And that just... that ran all through me. I'm all for changing hearts'n minds, but this was like political activism using students as meatshields. And I could fight, I could defend myself, but most of those students? They couldn't. They were just targets."

His hands raise in equal parts disbelief and exasperation.

"Then the friends I had turned on me. And the faculty started targeting me. And just after turning seventeen, I realized I couldn't stay. So I left."

The communicator is held steady between thumb and forefinger.

"Since until you met me, I've been living on the street. I had nowhere to go. I had no one. Just empty alleyways, a broken dream, and a power I refused to use to force myself into a better position. I wound up in Mutant Town, before the sentinel attack. I saw the people there, harassed, attacked - not only by regular people, but by their own citizens. People with powers, hurting mutants to get ahead."

"I had a choice. Die there, or make my life mean something. I knew what I wanted to do, and even if everyone I ran into kicked me to the curb, I'd keep coming back. Didn't have anything else. Didn't have options. I became Volt. And I kept that memory of those heroes I'd seen on t.v. Captain America, you know? He does more than fight crime and stop evildoers. He's a symbol. He's someone that you can look at and go, 'There's still hope.' I told Kian when I first met'em, superheroes don't just save lives. They save /hearts/. And if I, a mutant, could do that for people - that'd make it worth it. If I could be a symbol, with or without my lame look, something to inspire people and get them to believe the world /can/ be good... that's worth fighting for."

He glances down. "That's worth every damn cold night."

"That's worth every daily life-or-death fight with superpowered criminals."

"To be bigger than life, but to impact something so much bigger than myself."

He exhales a soft sigh.

"More than a year. That's what I did. I trained. I fought. I honed myself. I scraped by."

His head turns to her. "And then you met me. And you looked at me as if I had no experience." There's a beat. "Do you get it now?"

Stardust has posed:
    Colette does manage to collect herself and find a straight face. Honest. It just takes a few moments and a few deep breaths, and she's able to listen to the rest of his story without any further attacks of giggling. She nods at a few places, frowns at the talk of Xavier's and looks slightly pained at the mention of the sentinel attacks. She's actually a pretty decent listener when she can keep the laughter under control.

    "Okay," Colette says slowly when he's done. "My turn. Not the full story. Just kind of... a detail. I joined the Titans pretty much by accident. Ran into Vorpal a couple of times. He left me the number. I wasn't really planning on... you know. Then one day I ran into something that just seemed like too much for me to handle on my own. So I called that number. A few of them turned up to help out. One of those was Cassie. She and I had met before a few times. Kinda got friendly. She'd never mentioned she was in the Titans. Anyway after we saved the day, we all went back to the Tower and I just kind of... well, next thing I knew I was a member."

    She falls silent a moment, lost in her own thoughts before she starts up again. "Fast forwards to... I dunno. Last winter I guess. I was... well to be honest I've always kind of thought... I'm not sure my instincts are as noble as yours. I mean being the inspiration thing. I was kind of thinking of packing it all in. Not just the Titans. The whole hero thing. I mean I know... no. That's not relevant. The thing was... I couldn't. People needed me. The TEAM needed me. Because things were... well Robin had some issues he needed to deal with. No... it kind of goes back before then. There was this one case... nobody was taking leadership. Nobody was figuring it out. I'm just not the detective type, not one of the smart ones. But someone /had/ to figure this out."

    Colette stops herself with a sigh. "I'm making this story way too complicated. Okay, so here's the thing. I feel responsible for the Titans. And for some reason, whenever we get a new prospect, it seems to fall to me to check them out, and make sure they are up to it. I didn't ask for that. I don't think I'm the right person to do it. But someone has to. Someone has to take responsibility for the team. The new people, but also the old. My friends. Because the thing about working in a team is you are /relying on other people/. You're not the only person who pays for your mistakes. You know what I mean?" She looks up at him, questioningly. "I feel responsible. For you, Kian, Megan, the other newbies. And also for the people who brought me into the team. If I let someone in who isn't up to it, I put them at risk. And I put my team mates at risk. I never judged you, Volt. I had nothing to judge you on. Still don't, really. But what I did to was test you. Honestly, if someone can't put up with me being a bit of a hardass, they don't want it enough. And if they don't want it enough, then they are putting themselves in danger. And if I don't spot that quickly enough, I'm putting the whole team in danger."

    Colette gets to her feet, and walks over to the bike. She crouches by it, examining it for damage. "So. I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings. If you stick with us, at some point, despite everything I can do to stop it, you'll probably get more than your feelings hurt. But you know what? I think you /do/ want it. I think you want to make a difference. I think you're an intelligent guy, I think you're dedicated, and I think you've thought about this a lot. That's more important to me than your experience, because even if you had none - that's something you can learn. I don't think people can just learn those other things."

Stardust has posed:
    "So. That's it." Stardust looks back at Volt and shrugs her shoulders. "I'm not saying my techniques are perfect. Actually I keep telling the other people it's a really bad idea that I'm the one handling this stuff. But I need to know. " She picks the bike up one handed, and hefts it under her arm - definitely at least a bit of superstrength there. "Experience - even powers. That's not the number one thing when it comes to being a part of the team. Robin has no powers but a ton of experience. I turned up with no experience but some useful powers. I'm not worried about that stuff. It's teamwork that worries me. And that... I think you'll do fine. Does that help at all?"

Volt has posed:
"Yeah, no, I get you. I'm new to this bunch, you don't know much about me, I get it. And I wanna hear more about all of that. But." Volt lifts to his feet and cants his head. "I'm Volt with or without the Titans. I'm not a sidekick. I'm not a kid who needs tutoring or homework. I came here to be on a team, not someone's project, not someone's weapon. We should train, yeah, and my powers will get more refined even past what they already are. But they're my powers. I know'em. I understand'em. I developed them through training and in the crucible of fighting crime. If I need to prove myself before you people see me as a team member, that's fine. But there's been an awful lot've looking down noses at me - like a lesser."

"/That's/ why I said I regret coming here the way I did. It looked desperate. Completely overshadowed everything I've done, everything I've worked for, everything I've gone through. Make sense?"

Stardust has posed:
    "Makes perfect sense," Colette replies. "I mean this team actually started out because some people wanted to not be sidekicks. I mean it's useful having a mentor, but they're a massive pain in the ass." She walks in the direction of the elevators, then stops and turns again. "I'm not putting myself forwards as a mentor. I'm not looking for a sidekick. And there's no homework. What I asked you and Kian to do was to teach each other. None of the training schtick I'm pushing here has anything to do with teaching you how to 'hero'. I'm hardly Wonder Woman here. She's been at it for decades, I've barely started. It's to do with you training with us so that you get used to working with us, and us training with you so that we get used to working with you. Because you can be the best solo hero in the world and still a liability if you're not functioning as part of the team. If you do something 'cos you /know/ it's the right thing to do, and everyone's expecting you to do something else... well, it's not good. This doesn't replace what you've done before, what you've worked at before. It's something new. Does /that/ make sense?"

Volt has posed:
Volt props a fist to his hip, watching her. "Well yeah, of course. And I look forward to that. I just needed that to be clear."

He's not entirely sure his meaning was taken, but pushing it further feels like it's spoiling for an argument. So at this point, he's defaults to silence and a small frown. The only question left is how long will the elevator take and make this moment super awkward?

Stardust has posed:
    The elevator does not take long at all. In fact the door opens as soon as Colette presses the button. However there's no elevator visible - just the inside of the elevator shaft. She doesn't seem surprised by this. Nor does it seem to be an issue for her, as she steps into the shaft carrying the bike, and doesn't fall. "I did say before, the Titans is about learning together. That means we learn from you too. I haven't seen you in action, but I'm not doubting you know how to do Volt things just fine. I'm looking forwards to learning about those Volt things. Gimme a chance when I say we're the ones who know the Titans things though, okay?"

    Colette drops down out of view.

    About four seconds later, she comes back into view. "Oh. Uh. This isn't an invisible elevator. I'm flying. Didn't want you to try it and fall down or something. Thought I better warn you." She grins sheepishly and tilts her head to the side, apparently awaiting some response.

Volt has posed:
Volt blinks when she walks into what looks to be a vacant elevator shaft. But he frowns a little at what she says. "I know. I'm not doubting that. I'm just talking about respect," he says as bluntly as possible. Though it wasn't the lion's share of his questioning his involvement with the group, feeling looked down on was a pretty heavy detractor. But after tonight, he can give it a bit longer and see how it goes. Up to this point, it felt good to actually communicate with her and make some kind of connection. This latter end, though - was it a complete miss?

"Oh, uh, yeah. I won't be walking blind into open elevator shafts any time tonight."

Stardust has posed:
    Colette looks throughtful for a few moments, then nods her head slowly. "Okay. Here's my plan. We go on patrol later this week. Sound good? Oh. And I did. The elevator shaft, I mean. The first time. I wasn't expecting the door to open without an elevator actually being there, and I was kind of not paying attention. Luckily, I bounce."