Treed Life

[Asli Tilki]

"I highly suggest you get down from there immediately," Asli said, unable to keep quite all her annoyance out of her voice. She'd been called out into the courtyard to deal with this, being an official who happened to at least be in the general area. By now Asli had experienced some of the inherent... silliness that came with putting teenagers with powers all together in a relatively confined space. Experiencing it, getting used to it, and tolerating it were different creatures altogether.

"I do not know how you even managed to get up there," Asli said, almost to herself as she circled the tree. There didn't appear to be any branches.... no, there were perhaps a few that a student could utilize to clamber up higher into the tree. Still, this struck Asli as a completely ludicrous situation to find oneself in. A student, trapped in a tree.

Sighing with irritation, Asli backed up, lips pursed, and stared up at the treed individual. "What are you waiting for?" she asked, before locking on to start reading emotions, willing to make this as simple as possible.

[Kai Baxter]

Kai was adjusting fairly well to the school. Sure there were things here and there that they didn't like, but it was far better than other living situations they had been in. Overall, despite things not being completely perfect, they still would far rather be at Bellefonte than anywhere else. So, if they were mostly content at the school, why exactly were they currently up a tree? They weren't trying to avoid anyone in particular, but they were trying to avoid people in general. Or at least being in too close proximity to people.

After their power developed, they often found it annoying to be too near groups of people. Constantly hearing someone's breathing and heart beat could get really annoying. Luckily, Kai's power wasn't that strong yet and they had to be fairly close to someone for their senses to kick in. They had been trying to sit in the courtyard, minding their own business and writing. People continued to pass by or sit down near them, it had gotten distracting. Not wanting to leave and find a secluded spot, Kai had decided to scale a tree to get far enough away from the people below.

That was why they were now perched in said tree, their back to the trunk, writing in the notebook balanced in their lap. That is, until they were interrupted again. Kai peered down at the woman below, looking unimpressed with the request to come down. "Why?" they said simply. "I'm perfectly fine up here." More than fine. They didn't want to get down. "I just climbed up. No teleporting powers or anything." It had been a little difficult, but Kai was tall and had been able to reach up to the lowest branches with minimal clambering. They still hadn't moved to get down, still simply gazing at the woman. They didn't see the problem with hanging out in a tree and didn't know why they were being told to get down.

[Asli Tilki]

There, the voice helped Asli target on on the individual a little better. Asli's power locked on almost immediately after her eyes fell on the student up there, reading the emotions and not detecting anything like a warning sign. The student seemed perfectly calm and at please with with themself. So, why had Asli even been called out here?

She folded her arms over her chest. "I was told to come here and help get a student down," she said. The student claimed to have gotten up there on their own, which struck Asli as somewhat surprising. she did another look around, frowning and wondering how they'd managed it without any nearby branches to clamber onto.

"Perhaps if you would offer some explanation I can carry back," Asli offered, gesturing toward the student. "As I can hardly explain that a student somehow mysteriously clambered up a tree and appears to simply be enjoying themselves like some sort of strange... creature. A squirrel or a monkey perhaps."

[Kai Baxter]

After being told that she had come out to get them down, Kai looked around the courtyard, wondering if they could figure out who had called her out there. Maybe someone thought it was funny. "Well, I'm fine and don't need help," Kai responded, feeling a bit defiant now. "People are idiots, maybe someone thought I was stuck." They weren't stuck and they didn't want to come down. Or at least... they didn't think they were stuck. Since they hadn't actually tried to get down yet, they didn't know if they had gone and made the classic mistake of getting up a tree they couldn't get down.

"I didn't mysteriously climb up a tree, I just climbed up." They were getting a bit more annoyed now. Why did they have to justify everything? Was it against school rules to climb a tree? "See those knobbly things on the trunk? I used those until I could get to the branches." They didn't know why they were bothering to explain themselves, except that it felt like they were being accused of something. Especially that comment about being a creature, that made them bristle. They knew she was just referring to the fact that they were up a tree, but they had been called "it" enough times to be bothered by being referred to as a creature.

"I wanted to get away from people. Or at least far enough away. Everyone is so loud, to me, at least." They figured she would get the implication without having to explain that it was a power thing. Their tone was more distant now, bothered by what she had said earlier. "How would you help anyway? Are you super stretchy or something?" Otherwise, Kai didn't think she could do much to remove someone from a tree.

[Asli Tilki]

Yes, this was increasingly looking like one of those situations which was a giant waste of Asli's time, not to mention the time of nearly everyone else associated with it. Why had they bothered to report something like this? The student seemed to think that maybe someone thought they were stuck, which may have been the case from a transformation or the like. But they kept insisting about some sort of handholds, and eventually Asli located something that looked like it might work, though she wouldn't have tried it herself (Asli wasn't even sure she could think of a reason for going into a tree).

Away from people: that, Asli could understand, particularly for certain powers. When she was younger, her own could drive her to distraction. Even now she needed regular meditation and alone periods to regulate herself and make sure she didn't do anything too... drastic.

"I could make you so utterly terrified of heights or trees that you would panic and all but leap down," Asli said, clipping the words, "something that you should probably take into consideration, as you are expressing quite a bit of attitude to someone who works at this institution and thus has authority over you," Asli folded her arms, planting her feet and looking up challengingly at the student. Now she had a complete lock, and if need be, she'd start twisting emotions almost immediately. The irritation she felt was likely to start the process early, in fact.

[Kai Baxter]

The longer this interaction went on, the more annoyed Kai was growing. They had been perfectly happy perched up here in their tree. They had been writing, not hurting anyone and simply enjoying being outside far enough away from people to not activate their power, yet not completely isolated. What on earth was wrong with that? It wasn't their problem that someone had idiotically called someone over. They had expected to be left alone now that they had cleared things up, but that didn't seam like it was going to be the case.

They were also only growing more defiant as the conversation progressed. Had the woman asked them nicely to get down or provided a compelling reason to do so, they probably would have complied. They weren't completely unreasonable. As it was, now that they had been ordered to do so and practically threatened, they didn't want to out of spite. They closed their notebook and replaced it in the pocket of their cargo jacket, but did not move to climb down.

"Why?" they challenged defiantly, scowling down at the woman. "I'm perfectly happy up here and I'm not bothering anyone." Their irritation was only growing, this wasn't fair. "I only have an attitude because you're demanding I get down for no apparent reason. I told you that I wasn't stuck and I told you why I was up here. You're the one being unreasonable, not me." They didn't care how likely it was that they would get in trouble.

[Asli Tilki]

Asli's brows quirked. Irritation had slid into the student, and she wasn't sure whether to increase that or even do anything with it. It was relatively close to the fear she'd need to push into them in order to get them to move, and it was tempting to just jump to that.

"I'm demanding because I'm a staffer and you didn't listen to me," Asli pointed out. "You're the one being disrespectful of authority. In point of fact, I had stated that I would have carried back some information. They sent me out here, telling me that a student had gotten themselves stuck up in a tree. You're here. Ergo you're the student. Ergo it's my job to get you down. Yet you decided that you'd rather be difficult than simply cooperate."

Which Asli still didn't quite understand, beyond the student just being a rebellious teenager. If they'd already clambered up there, wouldn't it be just as easy to climb down and back up again the moment she left and reported a job well done? Asli tapped her fingers against her arm, considering.

"Perhaps if you apologize, we can work out some sort of agreement," she offered, seeing that as a more than fair alternative right now. That being said, she was more than willing to make them understand why disagreeing with staff, particularly her, was a poor decision.

[Kai Baxter]

Because I said so was probably one of the worst strategies to get Kai to cooperate. The more they were told that they should do what they were told just because this woman was an authority figure, the less Kai wanted to actually do it. Kai wasn't one to disobey authority or break rules for the thrill. Rather, they did what they wanted and what they thought was right and they didn't care if they broke rules in the process. This was one of those cases, they were going to stand their ground (so to speak) as long as they continued to see the request as unreasonable.

"But I was cooperating!" Kai was completely exasperated at this point and it would not take an empath to see that. "And I'm not going to apologize. There's nothing for me to apologize for." Kai was perfectly aware of the fact that the more they talked the more they were probably just digging their own hole. The easiest thing would certainly be to apologize and move on, they knew that. It didn't mean they were actually going to do it, though. "You asked me what I was doing up here and I told you. So why don't you just go away now?" They made a dismissive gesture with their hand, shooing away the woman.

[Asli Tilki]

Oh, such a mistake to make, particularly with someone like Asli. She supposed that most of the other staff at this too lenient school would've been perfectly accepting and understanding. This student was going through a lot: puberty, powers, separation from family, relocation to a fairly new place. Even the ones who had stuck around for a while had all sorts of problems.

Asli didn't care.

"for the record," she said, keeping her eyes locked as she started mentally working through the emotions, psychically sensing nerve impulses, "I did offer," she smiled slightly at that, before letting her ability reach out to start manipulating. She just wanted to twist a little right now, enough to make this student perhaps a little afraid. Not of anything in specific, but just sliding a little fear into the mixture. Given the annoyance, it shouldn't be too hard, and Asli expected that it would be a good signal of just what she was capable of should the student persist.

[Kai Baxter]

Kai let out a wordless groan of frustration, throwing their head back and rolling their eyes. How they had gotten to this point, they weren't even sure anymore. From their point of view, they had done nothing wrong and should have been left well alone awhile ago. The more they argued though, the less they could comply with the requests without looking the fool. Kai was extremely stubborn though and at this point wasn't going to get out of that tree until they were forcibly removed or got an apology. The forcibly removed option was starting to look more and more likely.

At this point, the strongest emotions Kai had been feeling were annoyance and exasperation. They weren't afraid of heights or even what the consequences of their behavior might be. However, as they continued to glare down at the woman, fear and panic started to creep in on them. They grabbed a nearby branch, suddenly worried that they might fall. It was a moment before Kai remembered what the woman had threatened. "What are you doing? Knock it off!" It was some sort of fear or emotional manipulation, Kai knew that, but it didn't make it feel less real.

[Asli Tilki]

Frustration boiled up in there. Asli could read it quite clearly; the hard emotion there. It was always hard to work against something like that. Frustration was just such an immobile feeling, particularly when the source didn't immediately leave the vicinity. But ah, there was the fear and panic. Asli could feel it, and she smirked, feeling the high that always came when she successfully moved someone.

Ah, now more frustration! Rage boiling, feeding the fear. Asli could feel a hand raising, and she was tempted to start literally conducting. "I did warn you," she said, her eyes sliding up to give the student a more studied look. "You may come down of your own volition, or I'll be forced to continue."

More rage? Yes, get them angry enough at Asli to come down. They couldn't actually hit a faculty member, not without severe repercussions. And if they did, well, it would almost be worth it, wouldn't it?

[Kai Baxter]

Kai was still feeling the effects of the emotional manipulation, but was able to resist scrambling out of the tree the way they wanted to. At that moment they strongly wished that they could respond in turn. It was too bad their power was only sensing. If they could, they would have made her as uncomfortable as possible. Unfortunately, Kai had no ability to affect another person. So far they felt like their power was more of an inconvenience than anything.

Despite the fact that they knew the woman had the power to force them down, Kai's stubbornness continued to keep them rooted to the spot. They fought the fear that made them want to get themselves out of that high place as soon as possible, the effort clearly showing on their face.

"Won't you get in trouble for using your power on a student?" they asked, trying to keep their voice steady. They hoped she would, but it seemed unlikely. Kai didn't have any misconceptions that they would be able to wage a complaint. It would be their word against hers and Kai was too used to being seen as an unreliable trouble maker to even bother trying. No, if they wanted to get back at her, they would have to do it themselves.