a golden state of mind.

Normally, Josh was the one conjuring up theories very similar to Charlie’s mailroom conspiracy in Always Sunny. He was the one that believed in ghosts and supernatural forces. Gideon could twist those into fact based happenings every time no matter what, yet this time he was the one spouting ideas about this cat. It almost makes him laugh, but instead he moves on hoping Josh doesn’t mention this to anyone. “Right…” Gideon stroked his chin as he stared down at the now calm cat, “maybe we could get a professor to back us up. Like… say the cat is actually theirs but it likes our room.” There had to be at least one instructor out there with a soft spot for animals.

“A name would be a good idea…” he begins until Josh decides to lay the responsibility of gender on him. His face contorts from slight shock to a deadpan and he’s just staring as he moves closer to the cat. “Does it really matter? We can name a boy or girl cat anything we bloody please, right?” Still, he reaches out to the cat and is able to scoop it up with a bit of effort and a lot a bit of claws. Cradling the creature to his chest, Gideon tries to get a look but doesn’t really see anything because of their limited light down here in the dark basement. “I don’t feel anything, but it could be fixed right and they look the same?” He honestly had no clue and he wasn’t about to piss off the poor thing by violating it’s personal space further.

“Let’s just go upstairs and ask McCoy… maybe he can be the cover for us too.”

Josh shrugs, desperately trying to keep the smile from his face. He didn’t think Gideon would actually go for it, and seeing his friend grope this absolute goblin of a cat was such a hysterical visual. “Guess you’re right,” he resigns, but only after he was certain he’d sucked out all the amusement from the moment. He then pulls a face at Gideon’s suggestion to speak to McCoy. “You really think he’s going to be onboard with this?” He figures their options were pretty limited to begin with. Kitty might be cool enough to keep their secret, and given her namesake, Josh figures they’d at least have that flimsy argument going for them. Come on, from one Kitty to another... There was also Remy, who had an obvious affinity for cats and might take pity on their new friend. It was still quite the gamble. He is reminded then of the hour, and resolves that if there was any lecturer still awake it was likely the good doctor. “Alright, sure,” he says, “We’ll go see if he’s awake, but if not we’re just gonna have to take it back to our room and deal with this in the morning.” He looks between the cat and Gideon. “But we should still try to hide it.”

The idea came to him a moment later, and he was nearly about to suggest Gideon be the one to execute it, but even Josh was not that unfair. He unzipped his hoodie and gingerly took the cat from his friend’s arms. And with a silent wish for luck, he zipped his hoodie back up with the cat inside. It was still behaving pretty mildly about this whole awkward situation, its massive fluffy head resting lazily a few inches below Josh’s. It twitched a mangled ear. “Sorry about this,” he says before zipping up the hoodie all the way to his chin. Any idiot with a pair of eyes would be able to tell that Josh was smuggling something under his jacket, but he was counting on the cover of darkness to at least give them some leeway. He steps towards the stairs and takes a well-here-goes-nothing kind of breath. “Alright. Let’s do this.”

Gideon stares at the cat, arms folded, as it devours the Doritos laid before it. The thought of a hunger like that reminds him of Kitty, which is pretty hilarious now that he thinks about it. Maybe this cat is her spirit animal. “Yeah, right like it’d appreciate me changin’ skins right in front of it.” he rolls his eyes, but considers the idea only because at least he’d be stone and those skinny little needle toes couldn’t hurt him. He almost winces when Josh reaches out, but what the rabid creature does next is more surprising.

“What?” Gideon almost chokes and leans back, “No way, no no no. C’mon mate…” Looking back down at the pathetic creature, Gideon’s idea doesn’t falter. The cat looks like it’s about ready to pounce on him and scratch his eyes out. “Is it even really a cat, what if it’s a mutant shapeshifter tryin’ to trick us?” Now he sounded like Josh with his conspiracy theories. Oh how the tables have turned. After rubbing his chin for a moment, Gideon reaches out expecting the curious cat to scratch him again. When it doesn’t he sighs and gives up, “Fine, but you’re cleaning up after ‘em.” Now that Josh pointed it out, he did see a bit of a resemblance to his ‘natural’ form and the way it ate those chips… he couldn’t be heartless when the little fella was just frightened.

Josh gives a triumphant grin. He knew his friend would come around. There was no way he nor Gideon would have the heart to leave the poor thing down here to its own devices. And who’s to say the next person to stumble upon it would treat it with the same kindness? This was, after all, a dangerous place to be skulking about. Spook the wrong person and it could’ve ended up fried to a cat crisp.... among a multitude of other horrific ways to die, come to think of it. This was kind of a house of horrors. Josh wasn’t going to let that happen. He’d always wanted a pet growing up, though his father was adamant against it. Of course, he had wanted a dog, but he figures this isn’t half bad. After all, beggars can’t be choosers. Though, to be fair, the only thing he’d been “begging” for that night was to witness something spectral. Instead they found an absolute unit of a cat. 

“Okay, but if it was a mutant shapeshifter,” he remarks, “that would still make for a pretty good story.” The cat had finally calmed in their presence, stretching out on its stomach as it observed them both with large knowing eyes. Josh could’ve sworn that it knew what they were talking about. Maybe their was some truth to Gideon’s crackpot theory. He makes a mental not to do anything particularly embarrassing in the cat’s presence. “We’ll just have to real careful, you know. Can’t let anybody know we’re harboring a fugitive. I really doubt the Professor would let us keep a cat in our dorm if he knew.” He pauses and meet the cat’s own steady gaze. “Oughta give it a name. Though I guess we should try to figure out if it’s a boy or girl friend. So, uh... you feel free to scope that out.”

“Is anything real?”

Josh’s powers were really fucking cool, not that Gideon would ever tell him that. He’s pretty sure Josh already knew anyway. Watching the scratches fade, Gideon tries to think about possible ways to make a cat trap if they couldn’t find one. It needed to snap shut as soon as the cat walked in it. If they set up a box with a stick on it, he’s pretty sure this particular cat wouldn’t be stupid enough to go under the box. Before he can suggest anything though, Josh is already onto his next idea.

“Do you think it even knows what Kill Bill is, bruv?” As the cat starts to settle down slightly, Gideon looks impressed and starts nodding his head, “A'right… I see it’s actually workin’ well.” A thought comes to him and he wonders if perhaps the cat attacked him because it was afraid because of his height. Staying much closer to the ground this time, Gideon starts chit chatting with it, “So do ya got a name? Like a human name?” He feels like an idiot talking to a cat like this and his left eyebrow shoots up, “Sorry, mate ya right. Don’t know what I was thinkin’. Ya can’t even talk.” It’s not exactly a surprise when the cat starts sniffing the Dorito closest to it, Gideon turns to Josh and asks, “So what, do we grab it or leave a huge trail all the way up to our room?”

“I don’t know, maybe,” Josh says in response to the Kill Bill question. “Look into it’s eyes and tell me that cat hasn’t seen some shit. It could like Tarantino.” He realizes then he was almost feeling bad for the creature, despite the fact that it still looked like it might lunge at their throats at any second. As he lays the last Dorito down before Gideon, he plops down on the concrete beside his friend. “Uh... you know... I hadn’t really thought that far.” He admits, sheepish. “I was kinda hoping it would chill out enough so that one of us could pick it up.” And then what? Take it to a shelter perhaps, but Josh found it highly improbable that anyone would adopt a cat that looked like... Well, like that. The cat scarfs down the first chip and moves onto the second, looking noticeably calmer. Maybe it was just hangry. 

He nudges Gideon’s shoulder with his own as they continue to watch the cat inhale Dorito after Dorito, working its way closer to them. “Hey, you know what, it does kinda look more like a gargoyle than a cat. Maybe if you shift and do your gargoyle thing it’ll like us better.” Josh was joking, but as the cat quickly approached it was starting to seem like not too bad an idea. It seemed that the cat had finally caught onto their scheme, halting right before the final Dorito and gazing at them wearily with big yellow eyes. Josh hesitantly reaches a hand out to to let the cat sniff it, face already screwed up as he anticipates the pain that was surely to come from this poor decision. Surprisingly the cat remained calm, after a moment even letting Josh scratch it behind the ears. He thinks he can even hear it purring. And that was all it took for him to turn to Gideon and say, determinedly: “Let’s keep it.”

It was impossible. Hank had seen many people hit by Alex’s blasts, and not many of them had lived. But what Alex had unleashed on the Professor that day wasn’t a small attack, he’d been furious and in pain. Somehow, Jean had survived the hit. Jean had always been remarkable, her power and skill exceeding the Professor himself. But she was also wild, untameable. Dangerous, and that’s why the Professor had done what he did all those years ago. Seeing her like this, now, he can’t help but have a hunch about what was going on. And he didn’t like it.

Calling in Josh was a last ditch effort, not because Josh was incapable of helping but because he didn’t like to involve students in matters this serious. The last thing he wanted, should they fail in waking Jean entirely, was for Josh to feel somehow responsible. He looks at the boy’s eager but terrified face as he comes in, his own expression grim. Jean was Josh’s best friend, but she was a little sister to Hank and Alex, like a brother. This whole incident has left him drained. “Josh,” he greets him with a firm clap on the back. “I want to start by saying this might be hard to see, okay? She looks… Well. She doesn’t look like she normally does.” Leading the younger man into the back of the infirmary where Jean rests in private, the redhead is floating above her bed. Her veins are accentuated, like there’s fire within them and even the ones on her face and forehead are lit. But her expression is peaceful, like she feels no pain.

Josh is startled by Jean’s glowing appearance, thinking it to be one of the oddest things he’d ever seen. Despite the fire that seemed to burn beneath her skin, her face was wondrously smooth and calm. Taking a few hesitant steps toward her floating body, he’s struck with an immense energy. Without yet touching her, the inner workings of her body spring into his mind’s eye in brilliant technicolor -- blazing red and orange. Whatever was causing this reaction was by no means organic, but it did not seem to be causing her harm. On the contrary, her molecules appeared to be adapting to the energy, absorbing it. She was growing stronger. He tells Hank as much, trying to suppress his emotions in order to give a leveled and clinical report. “Things might become clearer once I touch her,” he says, and slowly reaches a hand up to rest it on her thin arm.  

When Hank finally asks for his help, Josh is more than eager. He’d been itching to get into the infirmary and lay a hand on his friend, in hopes that maybe with his powers he could do something. Anything. Though it seemed he was mostly needed for his diagnostic abilities which only worried him more, for he was certain Hank, gifted and intelligent as he was, would’ve figured out what was wrong by now. A secret part of Josh feared he wouldn’t be much help either, but he knows he has to try. Pushing past the double doors to the infirmary, he notices Hank immediately. Going up to the doctor, he does his best to put on a brave face. “How can I help?”