*Chapter 7*
~Friday~
The past few days had been rather interesting. At least Zero thought so. That girl named Kitty didn't look like she shared his opinion of things though. The four days that he had been here she had spent either on her little computer or somewhere that he wasn't. She avoided him like the plague and when she was around him she was extremely nervous. Zero wasn't sure if he was supposed to be amused or annoyed by her behavior so he was neither. He simply ignored her and distracted himself with the TV like he always did. But this strangely seemed to bother her even more. Not that it bothered him. It was just a part of his new routine.
But today was different. Today was Friday and the day they would begin work. It started the same as the first four had. Kitty came up to harass him awake with her obnoxious cheerfulness and his attitude would chase her off. Then it was time for his simple breakfast of a couple frozen waffles followed by a hot shower. After the shower things had deviated from the routine. Normally by this time Mr. Logan would be out doing something, but today he was still here. The older man watched him and the girl and their interaction, or lack thereof. Why Mr. Logan was doing this Zero didn't know and didn't really care either. He simply did what he always did, watch TV and ignore the Americans.
Lunch came and went without incident. Ham sandwiches and potato chips again. Mr. Logan kept on watching as he ate his meal not saying a word. The oppressive silence got to be too much for Kitty so she finished her food quickly and left the two other Mutants to their own devices. Mr. Logan continued to study Zero watching his every move. Zero merely finished eating, cleared his place, and returned to the television. He ignored the probing gaze of the older man with ease. Zero was used to this intense type of scrutiny and was far beyond caring about it. Just ignore it and it will go away eventually, everything did. And Mr. Logan did go away, leaving Zero alone again. Not that he really noticed.
***
Kitty was something of a nervous wreck. The advice that Rogue had given her wasn't helping. Maybe she should write her again. And tonight they would begin working that Blue Lotus club. With all this stress how could she 'relax and ignore the guy' like Rogue said? Now Logan was here watching how they got along with each other before they went out. Her stress level was rising by the hour and the heavy silence in the small apartment didn't help matters any. Lunch was the absolute worst though. It was so quiet and tense in the kitchen that she couldn't take it and had to leave. She fled to the room she shared with the emotion-challenged German teen and paced the length of the narrow room for several minutes. Once she had calmed down some she seated herself at the desk and fiddled nervously with her laptop. Not long after Logan abandoned his one-sided staring contest and came to talk with her.
"He's watching TV again, isn't he." Kitty stated, not looking up from the screen.
"Yep. Is that all he does all day?" The Canadian asked as he sat himself on the edge of the bed.
"Yes that's all he does. Never changes the channel, just watches whatever is on." Kitty sighed, turning from the report she'd been typing to face her Instructor. "All he does is stare at the TV and ignore me."
"And why does this bother you?" Logan asked.
"If there was someone else around to talk to then I don't think this would bother me so much. But he's the only person around and all he does is stare at the TV and I'm left with nothing to do. The few times that I've managed to get his attention he gives me the creepiest look." Kitty miserably complained.
"Did you ask anyone back home about this?" The feral Mutant inquired.
"Yes, I asked Rogue. She told me to 'relax and ignore the guy'. Easy for her to say." The younger Mutant grumbled.
"True, but if you let him get to you like this the mission will go on longer. It's not going to be easy for you but you have to try and ignore those looks. Treat him just like you treat Rogue and I think you'll do just fine." The older man suggested.
"I don't know, I'll try it." Kitty mumbled doubtfully.
"You do that." Logan said as he stood to leave. "I'm going off to talk with him now, see you at dinner."
"Good luck." She called after him. You're going to need it. She added silently.
***
Zero sat quietly on the worn couch watching TV as usual. Mr. Logan had finally left him alone. Now there was only some children's program on the local public access channel which he thought was rather stupid. But small children probably loved it so he could take it just fine. But his peace didn't last, Mr. Logan returned from where ever he was and turned off the television set. Zero blinked for a moment, startled by the sudden end to the dancing pictures on the screen. He slowly turned to face the older man and see what he wanted.
"So Zero, how've you been?" Mr. Logan asked somewhat politely.
"Fine." Zero responded.
"What do you think of America so far?" Mr. Logan inquired.
"It is fine." Zero replied.
"It's just 'fine', nothing more specific?" The older man pressed.
"Nein." Zero confirmed. Mr. Logan sat back and studied Zero a moment before speaking again.
"So I take it that you're always this way." The man stated, Zero nodded. "You've always had the social graces of an ice cube and the personality of a blank sheet of paper then?" Mr. Logan continued and again Zero only nodded in response. "Great." The man growled, so much for getting a reaction out of him. "Well what do you think of Kitty?" Mr. Logan asked, hoping for a non-monosyllabic response. The young German remained silent for several minutes pondering his response.
"She seems nervous all the time but other than that she is fine." He replied finally. Mr. Logan sighed as he slowly shook his head.
"Kitty's nervous all the time because you scare her. To her you're like the living dead and that tends to bother the average person. And when you go out tonight you're going to be dealing with average people. What do you plan to do about that?" The man quietly asked.
"I know how to act, I can get by." Zero answered. Mr. Logan looked skeptical.
"We'll see. In the meantime try and get along with Kitty a bit better. It'll make things easier and she'll really appreciate it. You clear on that?" Mr. Logan gruffly demanded.
"Ja." Zero replied. The American, apparently satisfied, nodded and left the room. Once he was gone Zero returned his attention to the TV, turning it back on to catch the end of the children's program. The meaningless images paraded across his vision and the foreign sounds invaded his ears but very little reached his consciousness. He mulled over his new instructions concerning his 'partner'. So he had to be nice to her, try not to scare her, and still get his job done. Wunderbar.
***
When the TV turned back on Kitty let out a heavy sigh. She knew that she shouldn't eavesdrop but the apartment was so small and quiet that she couldn't help overhearing them. She returned her focus to her laptop somewhat disappointed by what little she had learned. Her theory was now confirmed; he had absolutely no opinions about anything. Whenever you asked him for his opinion he'd say 'fine' or that he didn't care. He'd probably agree with you no matter what you said and do whatever was asked of him without question. If you told him to jump off a bridge, he'd do it.
Kitty shuddered at that last thought. The very idea that a person like that could exist disturbed her. Zero was as close to being a mindless drone as anybody she'd ever met or even heard of. He was an emotionless automaton and probably had more in common with a factory robot than with another human being. But how did he get this way? Kitty wondered and instantly regretted it as her imagination ran through several horrible possibilities. Perhaps he had been abused to the point where he shut down emotionally to keep from hurting. Or maybe he'd been isolated from human contact until he pulled inside himself to escape the endless, tortuous boredom of eternal loneliness. Kitty violently shook her head to erase such frightening and disturbing thoughts. If she kept that train of thought going much longer she was going to give herself nightmares.
Kitty logged into her E-Mail account and scanned through her new messages. Spam, spam, spam, newsletter, spam, this spam filter is terrible. Hey wait, what's this? She paused her scrolling and found an E-Mail from her mother. Kitty opened the message and began to read. There wasn't much new, her parents were both fine, the weather was nice and things were going well. How were things going with her? Kitty immediately replied saying that she was fine too, the weather was good here and things were going alright at the moment. She also mentioned that she might be able to visit them soon and wondered when would be a good time to stop by. Once she sent that she settled back into the battered swivel chair, bored once more.
Now what? Kitty wondered. She'd done everything that she could think of like type that report she had to do for history, reorganize her files, and finally finished that program she'd been fiddling with for the past month. Now she had nothing left to do. The only possible thing that she could think of was watching TV, but that's what Zero was doing. Kitty would rather hang out with Logan but he wouldn't be around until dinner time. So that left her only two options, either stay in her room and go crazy from boredom, or go join Zero at the TV. She glanced at the time; it wasn't quite two o'clock yet. Kitty debated with herself for a few more minutes before she decided what to do.
She shut off her laptop, straightened up her desk, and left for the TV. The sight that greeted her was exactly what she expected to see. Zero sat stiffly on the couch, sans hologram, mindlessly watching whatever happened to be on. At the moment an infomercial featuring cookware was this hour's show. How the heck can he watch this? Kitty wondered as she timidly looked in from the hallway. Kitty nervously crept into the room and phased through the couch before sitting down on the tattered seat. She waited for a good five minutes for him to react but he didn't. His blank stare never budged from the TV screen. Zero didn't appear to notice her. This was really starting to get on her nerves. She remembered Logan's advice to pretend that Zero was Rogue and decided now was as good a time as any to try it out. So if Rogue was watching garbage on TV what would she do? Ask her politely to change the channel and if Rogue ignored her request, hit her with a pillow.
"Hey Zero, you're not really watching this right?" Kitty asked in her most cheerful voice. Silence. "I guess not, could you change the channel please?" She politely asked. Silence. She glared at him for a moment before snatching a small decorative pillow and whacking him upside the head with it. His eyes widened in shocked surprise as he slowly turned to stare at her, but she ignored him. He had ignored her so she would just ignore him for awhile. Kitty grabbed the remote from the coffee table and began channel surfing in search of real entertainment. She sat cross-legged and leaned up against the left arm of the old couch as she flipped through the stations. Boring, trash, re-run, seen it, stupid, boring, garbage, talk show, infomercial, re-run, hey! It's Jaws! She instantly recognized the infamous opening scene of the shark thriller and settled in for the show.