04-06-2023, 11:07 AM
Jude assumes that Near wants him to do the fighting, because of course Near would. Near is not cutting the figure of an action hero, and unless he does something even crazier like get out a gun, he probably figured Jude both can and would engage in some Harry Potter-style fight to the death. (Jude had been warded away from such fantasy fluff in his combination home schooling/boarding schooling, but hotel cable television has provided him this chunk of pop culture.) Near is thinking of the high school parking lot, and Jude is thinking of wizard robes.
"Well, first of all, I'm not sure I can be killed." He pulls out the biggest gun first, hoping to put Near off from the start. "And I'm not interested in finding out either," he adds hastily, before Near can propose some kind of elementary school science experiment. What Jude does involves taking the energy of life force and using it to bypass the laws of physics. So far he's demonstrated it consciously, by his own influence, but Jude isn't sure he's all conductor. He is certainly a conduit of things, things that exist a knife's edge away from them but are unseen and unfelt by anyone except him.
"Second of all I haven't ever fought anyone." Juliet was the fighter — brawler, Near would say, the one inclined to punch any schoolyard snot who cracked a test tube baby joke. She was only that for a few short years, a brief, violent adolescence. Near must think that Jude shares his sister's interests and capabilities. It's true, for some of them. But in a wizard battle Jude would likely panic. His path of least resistance plan here is exactly his speed.
"Well, first of all, I'm not sure I can be killed." He pulls out the biggest gun first, hoping to put Near off from the start. "And I'm not interested in finding out either," he adds hastily, before Near can propose some kind of elementary school science experiment. What Jude does involves taking the energy of life force and using it to bypass the laws of physics. So far he's demonstrated it consciously, by his own influence, but Jude isn't sure he's all conductor. He is certainly a conduit of things, things that exist a knife's edge away from them but are unseen and unfelt by anyone except him.
"Second of all I haven't ever fought anyone." Juliet was the fighter — brawler, Near would say, the one inclined to punch any schoolyard snot who cracked a test tube baby joke. She was only that for a few short years, a brief, violent adolescence. Near must think that Jude shares his sister's interests and capabilities. It's true, for some of them. But in a wizard battle Jude would likely panic. His path of least resistance plan here is exactly his speed.