[open] tonight we are young;

[adaptiveimmunities]

Who: Shaun Mason, Georgia Mason, and YOU.
Where: Lab, et cetera
When: Throughout the event
Rating: PG-PG13
Summary: Shaun and George are small, but they're not going to let that stop them.
The Story:

A - Puzzle Time

George is sitting on the floor, the pieces of the puzzle spread in front of her. "Shaun, I need the edge pieces. Come on. Can you focus for five minutes?" Here she'd thought his attention span was bad when they were grown-ups.

“Huh? Oh.” He looks at the piece in his hand which is… nothing like an edge piece. “Sorry, George. This thing is… really kind of violently colorful isn’t it?”

"It's Wonderland, I'm pretty sure that's on purpose." She takes the piece from his hand, rolling her eyes. The murky light of the lab is dark enough that she's mostly not bothering with her sunglasses, keeping them in her pocket and taking advantage of her weird black zombie eyes and the perfect night vision they give her. "Come on, the sooner we finish this, the sooner we can move on to something hopefully more interesting."

“Something where I get a gun?” Shaun mutters irritably. He hunts down a few edge pieces and offers them to her. They’d been told the creatures aren’t hostile, but Shaun hates being unarmed in unfamiliar surroundings.

"Here's hoping." She takes the pieces and puts them together, frowning down at the puzzle.

B - Vending Machine

They (well, George mostly. Shaun was more of a distraction) had managed to solve one of the puzzles without either of their eyes starting to bleed, and that had led them to a vending machine. The problem with being kids though, is that their reach is significantly diminished. It’s easy to look behind or around or underneath the machine, and of course they can see inside it pretty clearly, but the top is another matter.

“Hey, George. Climb on my shoulders.”

George looks up at the top of the vending machine. Even as an adult, she's not that tall, but she'd be able to get closer. As it is, this seems like the best shot they have. "Okay," she says, turning towards him. "Can you hold me? You're smaller than usual."

He raises an eyebrow at her. “I did when we were this size the first time, didn’t I?”

She rolls her eyes. "That was a long time ago." But she slings her legs over his shoulder anyway, holding onto his head.

He straightens slowly, holding onto her legs to stabilize her. “Do you see anything?”

"Hmm, I'm not high enough. Don't drop me." Carefully, she shifts one foot up to his shoulder, leaning one hand on his head and another on the vending machine as she very carefully stands up so she can peer over the top.

C - Blanket Fort

It's been a few days, and while they've made progress towards getting the keys they need to get their bodies back, they're not there yet. And sleeping in one big room with everyone is… uncomfortable. They've made do pushing two of the beds to the side and sleeping curled around each other, but it's still hard to sleep surrounded by other people.

But now, a few days in, feeling more childlike by the minute, there's a perfect solution to that. George tugs the mattresses off their beds and shoves them underneath the frames, then drapes the blankets off the side. A perfect fort.

“This might be one of the best ideas you’ve ever had, George.” Shaun crawls underneath the blankets and stretches out the mattresses underneath. He hadn’t been comfortable sleeping in the same room as everyone else, and this makes it a lot easier to relax.

"You might not have noticed, but I'm pretty smart." She takes another blanket and drapes it over them, curling up against Shaun's side. "I didn't like being a kid that much the first time. I wanna be big again."

“Same,” Shaun agrees, leaning against her. “But at least Mom and Dad aren’t here to stick cameras in our faces this time around. Silver linings.”

Comments

[postictal]

[He keeps an eye out for the brightly multicolored puzzle pieces - at least they stand out against the gloom. But a few seconds of tense, brusque walking don't reveal anything besides the same grim-colored tile and green-tinted walls he's been seeing this whole time.

He glances to one side to meet her eyes, briefly, before his gaze skates away.]

Don't - don't you?

[adaptiveimmunities]

[Shaun shrugs a shoulder.]

Well, it's not like this is the worst thing Wonderland has to offer, right? Being a kid again is annoying, but we still know who we are.

[chooseyouth]

Probably the least sucky event I've experienced so far. [Only because there's still Coke available. A few would probably have beat this one out if she could have dealt with them with a Coke in her hand, but Wonderland, unfortunately, does not seem to understand exactly how much of a basic necessity it is for her.]

And yes, we do want to be big again. But you really want to. Like, more than I'd expect. Why?

[postictal]

[How is this the least...?

Well, fine. Maybe it is. Maybe he can see their point. Memories intact - or as intact as they get for someone like him - no dangerous islands full of people trying to kill you, the place full of apparently benevolent monsters, no threat of drowning...maybe it is a better deal than the last few events.

One of these days, Wonderland will come up with an event that doesn't touch on one of Tim's manifold primal terrors.]

'Cause I hate being a kid. [It emerges slightly defensive, more than he'd like. It's not entirely a lie. He does hate being a kid. He's not nearly as - as leveled out at this age as he gets to be when he's older, for one.

And this place looks a little too much like a personal hell of his for another.]

[adaptiveimmunities]

[Shaun shrugs again. Being a kid means it's a little harder for him to focus than usual, he can't reach the top shelf, and he doesn't have a gun. All of that is inconvenient, but not world-ending to him. Especially when there aren't any zombies in the immediate future, and the monsters aren't aggressive.]

Sure. I mean, everyone hates not being able to get to the good stuff on the top shelves.

[chooseyouth]

I can't get the good stuff on the top shelves when I'm big either.

[MUST BE NICE BEING TALL. BOYS. Her scowl is brief since, well, Shaun can reach high shelves which is generally just as good. When he's not being an asshole. She refocuses on Tim.]

I assume the height isn't what you mean, though.

[The worst part about being a kid when it happened for real was their parents. But the Masons aren't here, so it could be a lot worse.]

[postictal]

You notice how everything feels the way it did when you were a kid?

[As in, even something small and seemingly innocuous can be completely, overwhelmingly terrifying. And every mild bout of terrors gets magnified out of proportion until your chest squeezes and your lungs compress. The shadows stretch, and every movement is something to be afraid of.]

[adaptiveimmunities]

Okay, you can stand on my shoulders when we're big again, too.

[He considers Tim's question for a moment.]

Yeah, I guess. My focus is definitely more shot than usual which was pretty standard when I actually was this age.

[But Shaun was never a kid with a lot of fear, so he's not quite getting what Tim is implying.]

[chooseyouth]

[She makes a face at Shaun. No, when she is bigger and has further to fall, she will not be standing on his shoulders. She's not that acrobatic.] Or I can just ask nicely.

[She turns back to Tim.]

And I want to throw things at Shaun for being so distracted and--wait, that's normal.

[She has noticed differences, but they're not feelings she wants to admit to. She feels like crying more than usual, and just because her fucked up eyes won't let it happen doesn't make the emotions less annoying. She isn't too scared either--why would she be? She has Shaun.]

But yeah, I have noticed that it goes beyond physical changes. I still remember being an adult, but... [She frowns.] Our brains aren't fully developed yet at this age. And we don't have all the right hormones. I don't know all the science, but at this age we lack a lot of impulse control and emotional control. I think.

[postictal]

[It's bad enough that he spends enough time regressing to that mean when he's not being physically de-aged. When It's around - when It's there, it's like he can't remember how to be. It's like he's just a scared kid all over again.

Except It's not here, and now he's feeling that anyway.]

What if it gets worse?

[The tremor in his tone is as much an indication as either them would need that the idea's been on his mind - and it scares him.]

What if it just...what if we just keep thinking like that?

[adaptiveimmunities]

[Shaun frowns.] Well, it's gonna wear off eventually, right? I mean, has Wonderland had an event that lasted more than a few days?

[Okay, there were those awful dreams of all-white creepy Wonderland, and that was almost two weeks, but it still went back to normal eventually.]

[chooseyouth]

[George nods seriously.] This isn't logical. [She grimaces.] Which isn't all that helpful with emotions, I know. My point is, there's no reason to think it'll go on forever. It's the lack of emotional control.

[Not that knowing it's a thing makes it easier to recognize in herself. She can only hope she can keep it together for the rest of the event. She's usually so good at being in control.]

[postictal]

[It'll wear off eventually, they say. No need to worry. Just Tim being irrational, being antsy, being panicky, because that's what he's good at, isn't it? Just jumping to all the wrong conclusions! He's entirely too good at that, it turns out.]

We could get stuck. And panic, and there wouldn't be any way to fix it and get better before we, before it all -

[He's gotta stop himself. Swallow hard, before it turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy.]

N-never mind.

[adaptiveimmunities]

Well, we could, I guess. [But Shaun's never been the type to dwell on worst case scenarios, even when he was a kid. He's always been more of a "live in the moment" type.]

But why worry about it before it happens?

[He shrugs.]

[chooseyouth]

[Georgia's the one with the worst case scenarios, but she's good at keeping them in, analyzing them and coming up with a good plan just in case of dismissing them as too unlikely to be worth considering. She gives Tim what she hopes is an encouraging smile.]

It's okay. We'll fix it if Wonderland doesn't do it for us. We're good at fixing things.

[postictal]

[Every scenario has the potential to be a worst case scenario. And Tim's brain being what it is, jumping to worst case scenarios is altogether far too easy.]

We can't fix anything. We're kids.

[Kids are...useless. You can't tell a kid what's really happening. You can't tell a kid about important things like, like violent episodes, or delusions, and you especially can't tell them the truth about anything.]

[adaptiveimmunities]

For now. But I don't see what that has to do with anything.

[chooseyouth]

[Georgia shakes her head.] No, we're not kids. We just look like them. And even if we were, so? We still can try.

[postictal]

We're gonna feel more and more like kids, and it's just gonna get worse.

[And it's only gonna get worse for a kid like Tim who was, apparently - a little prone to preemptive panic, regardless of how baseless it might be.]

[adaptiveimmunities]

[Shaun frowns. Well, Tim has that part right at least. The more time passes, the more kidlike Shaun feels. Which for him means a harder time sitting still and paying attention...

Which is not that different from his adult behavior, but he's a bit better at controlling it as an adult.]

Well, at least it can't last forever?

[chooseyouth]

[George was, at least, very put together from a very young age. She had to be. They already knew their role in their parents' lives, and someone had to make sure she and Shaun were okay.]

It can't. [Her voice is firm and confident. She's always been good at sounding like she knows what she's talking about. It helps that usually she does, but knowing and sounding like you know are two different skills. She's just lucky to have both of them.] We're in Wonderland and events always end after a few days. There aren't many constants here, but that's one of them. Events end.

[postictal]

[George's tone is firm and assertive, the same kind an adult might assume to assure a small, panicking boy that everything's going to be fine, really, and the strange man in the back of your head doesn't exist. Eventually you'll forget all about him, and none of it will matter.]

R-right.

[It's not much, but it's a small breath, a shaky nod. Some manner of equilibrium being established.]

Sorry. Sorry.