nexus_sages | (no subject)

She nods. "Not everyone likes talking about them directly, so."

"We don't when we're in public back home, but people are getting more accepting. Other kids in school knew I had superstrength, though they didn't know about any of the other stuff. Pretty much the only power I know I have that I don't have much practice in is how to fly."

"Really?" She shakes her head a little because that is hard to believe. "If I could fly, I'd be doing that all the time." Because that's the dream of everyone who grew up watching colorful heroes saving the day, isn't it?

"It's just because it's relatively new," he assures her with a smile. "I've been strong since I was a baby, was fast when I was six. I don't know when I got my dad's invulnerability because I didn't try to test it too much, but flying... that's pretty new."

"Well then, I'll be glad you're staying at a polite conversational distance instead of showing off," she teases. "Strong, fast, and you can fly? That's pretty much the whole superhero package, isn't it?"

Jon grins at that. "More like the starter kit. I don't have heat vision or freezing breath like my dad does, and I've never shown any signs of being telepathic like Mom is."

Verity would ask if he's serious if she didn't know he's serious. That's a lot of power for one person to have. "Well, it's a fine start. You're probably happier without the telepathy in the long run."

"Probably," he agrees, a little reluctantly. "One of my brothers inherited it and he's spent a lot of time by himself because of it."

"Yeah." Her gaze shifts away for a moment.

"I have a magic curse that tells me whenever someone's lying. It's not great for making a person feel social."

Jon doesn't have to think very long before he realizes why that's an issue. "Because people tell little lies all the time, I imagine. Answers to 'how are you' is a pretty big one."

She nods, and is visibly relieved to not have to explain. "All those 'polite fictions' that help grease the wheels of civilization. Every story. Every advertisement. It starts to hurt after a while. I can only imagine how much worse telepathy is."

"I'll try to keep that in mind... fortunately we've never really had to hide who we are here. The first people Dad met in the Nexus knew he was going to be Superman before he ever did, so it seemed kind of dumb to lie about not being an alien." He frowns as a thought occurs to him. "If I had my superhero name already and introduced myself that way, would that count as a lie for you?"

"It really depends on the person. If you consider that as much your identity as the name you were given at birth, no. When you're growing into it, it might. Some people change their names but wear them like a mask, and that I can tell." For such a blunt instrument, the curse is surprisingly subtle sometimes.

"Don't worry about it. It's my burden, not yours."

"Sure, but that doesn't mean I have to be insensitive about it or anything. I don't make a habit of out of lying when I don't have to, anyway. Not much point when Mom knows exactly who took the cookies out of the cookie jar without anyone saying anything."

She dips her head in concession; she's not going to try to argue him out of being nice. "That must have made for some interesting conversations when report cards got sent home."

"Sort of, but we all figured out real early on that lying to Mom was worse than getting bad grades."

"Usually is, even when your mom isn't a telepath. They always find out."

"That's what I hear," he says with a little laugh.

((Just curious, how old is Jon? I'm guessing teenager?))

"It's a conspiracy of adults, you know. We really are plotting." Or they were when Mother was around.

((He's eighteenish at the moment, just started college. His timeline's kind of wibbly to put it mildly.))

"Yeah, eyes in the back of the head, and all that. To be fair, Dad's not psychic either and he knows stuff. But he's Superman, so that's his excuse."

((But is it wimey?))

"I didn't realize those kinds of perks came with the job. You're making me rethink all sorts of life choices now."

((Absolutely!))

"Oh yeah?" he asks, a little curious.

(( ヘ( ^o^)ノ＼(^_^ ) ))

"The government where I'm from once offered to sponsor me as a superhero. I'm not sure what exactly they thought I'd do in a fight, but, everyone who wanted to be one was welcome to try."

"Sponsor, like a corporate thing? Were they going to make you wear flag patches or company logos or something?"

"Well, 'sponsor' as in I would have been legally allowed to do it, as opposed to the people who were doing it illegally. I would have been answerable to a government agency. They would have trained me some, and told me to be good, and kept an eye on me so I didn't lie-detect people to death or something. But considering the head of the agency I would have answered to was the owner of a massive technology company and a fascist, and the next guy was the head of a different tech company and a creep, I have to admit, I'm a little surprised the logos didn't come up."