The Early Morning Enterprise of Ridley G. Rhee

[Ridley Rhee]

It was 5:30 according to the monkey-shaped alarm clock by his bed when Ridley gracelessly tumbled from the twisted sheets, eyes still welded shut by sleep and brain not fully on. The boy stood in the middle of his new room, yawning, and frowned softly as he tried to remember why he was up before the good cartoons were on.

This puzzle followed him down the hall and into the bathroom. He was washing his hands when it all clicked - unfortunately it clicked just as he was squirting soap from the dispenser and the sink wound up with a generous layer of Bath & Body Works pooling in it's bowl.

Filled with purpose Ridley bolted into his mother's room, slowing to a loud shuffle as he maneouvered around boxes and approached the bed. He watched the steady rise and fall of her chest for a moment before he poked her in the arm.

"Mum." He whispered. When Clarity didn't stir he poked her again. "Mu-um. Wake up."

A loud groan issued forth from the blankets and she rolled over pointedly. Her voice was muffled by her pillow. "Whassa matter, Rids?"

Ridley edged onto the bed and bounced on his knees. "It's morning!" He crowed, as though that explained everything. He jostled the mattress again and Clarity moaned, casting a hand out in his general direction to try and get him to stop. He huffed. "You have to get up because I'm up!"

"Mmph go bug y'r fath'r." Clarity mumbled. Ridley perked up.

"Can I?"

There was a long pause before his mother replied, almost gleefully, "Yes. Go."

Which was how, at quarter to six, Ridley came to be outside John's suite in Transformers pajamas, merrily humming the theme from Spongebob and keeping time by drumming on the door.

[Dragon]

At 5:15, John's alarm went off. By then he was usually already awake by two or three minutes. His body was so regularly conditioned that he hardly even needed his alarm clock anymore.

After a brief stop in the bathroom, he began his morning stretches, a deliberate, graceful, almost dance-like routine of forms and katas designed to keep his joints and muscles at peak flexibility. It was as much a time of mental preparation as physical, a way of tuning himself to every part of his body. A scattering of bruises across his back twinged, the result of a few hard falls in his lessons with Banner Laverick, but he embraced the pain. It energized his stiff muscles, filled them with life and sped the healing process.

He was finished by 5:30, and that was when he stepped back into the bathroom and took a cold, then a hot shower, then brushed his teeth, combed his hair, and shaved. By 5:45, he was was just sitting down on the rug in his small living space, flanked by a shelf full of books and an antique incense burner, to meditate. Reverentially, he lit a stick of incense and laid it in the charred brass tray. Then he closed his eyes and inhaled, letting the sweet-smelling smoke fill his nostrils, his lungs, and his soul.

Something intruded on his quest for inner peace - something that sounded like very small hands tapping out a very jaunty beat on the other side of his door.

He inhaled again, entertaining a fleeting hope that the tapping would end shortly.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

John's eyes snapped open, and he could hear a little voice accompanying the tapping rhythm. On the chance that the sudden crescendo was some sort of refrain, he snuffed out the incense, stood, tightened the belt on his silk dressing robe, and gently opened the door.

"You're up awfully early."

[Ridley Rhee]

"So're you." Ridley countered with a grin, seizing John's legs in a fierce hug before pushing by. He padded over to the rug and flopped down onto his knees, leaning to sniff the incense curiously.

Beneath sleep-tousled hair, the boy's face wrinkled. He shot John a horrified look. "This smells like girl stuff!"

[Dragon]

John monitored Ridley's intrusion on his sanctum without comment; he honestly wasn't sure what the proper decorum was here, or if there even was one. Ridley didn't seem terribly concerned about it.

He smiled uncertainly and crouched down next to the boy. "It's incense. People have been burning it for thousands of years. I burn it because it reminds me of simpler times. It helps me keep my mind clear."

[Ridley Rhee]

"Still smells funny." Ridley sniffed it again to be sure and then fingered the tray in which the stick rested. His dad's place was very different from his mum's. It was a lot tidier for one thing, although Ridley suspected that had something to do with there being half as much stuff around.

Flopping onto his back, Ridley allowed his gaze to wander over the sparsely decorated space. He seemed perfectly at ease, contrasting his father as definitely as a mirror. "I dreamed about my old house on the beach. And ninjas. But not at the same time."

He laughed at that thought (because everyone knew that ninjas didn't belong on beaches) and then veered off on another track altogether, having yet to learn the art of segue. "You have lots of books. Where's your t.v?"

[Dragon]

Oddly enough, Ridley's dreams reminded John of a Danger Room malfunction over a year ago - not that he could tell his son about it, he realized with some regret. But Ridley was already moving on to other matters. It was a new experience trying to keep up with the boy's pace of conversation.

"I don't have a TV," John replied. "Just lots of books."

[Ridley Rhee]

"You don't have one?!" Ridley sat bolt upright, wide-eyed in amazement. He grappled to wrap his mind around that but after several minutes of gawking found that he couldn't.

"But whatta ya do?" Little palms gestured at the books emphatically - and with as much disdain as hands could express. "Just read? What about cartoons?"

[Dragon]

John laughed and tried to cover it up - he didn't want to be seen as mocking something that was obviously so vital to Ridley's gestalt.

"I keep very busy," he said. "I have to be careful what I do in my free time. Sometimes I read. Sometimes I run. Sometimes I just take walks through the gardens to cool off. Watching TV can take up an awful lot of time. I'm afraid I don't watch many cartoons."

[Ridley Rhee]

He took a moment to digest that, a look of suspiscious disbelief not quite leaving his face. How anyone could survive without a daily dose of animated shenanigans was beyond Ridley. Unless...

Of course. If his father was a super secret agent he wouldn't have much time for television. He was probably too busy practicing punching through stuff.

"Ohhh." Ridley nodded knowingly. "I gotcha."

He winked and then glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one had seen the gesture. It wouldn't do to blow his dad's cover. Ridley patted John's arm and lowered his voice to a deafening whisper. "Don't worry, y'don't hafta pretend. I know."

[Dragon]

John wrinkled his brow. A crazy thought occurred to him, that Clarity had told Ridley all about the X-Men, and now his son had him pegged as one of them.

He leaned toward the boy and whispered back, "You know what?"

[Ridley Rhee]

"That you're a spy." Ridley breathed. "Duh."

He looked a little worried that they might be overheard but it didn't stop him from continuing. "Don't worry, I won't tell. Are you CIA or like James Bond?"

[Dragon]

John laughed - and then realized he hadn't quite ruled out the possibility that Ridley knew something about the X-Men. After all, by his eight-year-old reckoning, spying was probably the best description for the sort of work they did.

Somehow he didn't like the idea of outright lying to his son first thing in the morning, so he decided to meet him halfway. "I'm only part-time," he said confidentially. "I'm a teacher too, after all. It's all right for you to know, but don't tell anyone. I need to keep my cover."

[Ridley Rhee]

Ridley nodded solemnly and traced an 'x' over his heart. "Cross my heart 'n' hope to die, stick a needle in m'eye."

He was struck dumb by the confirmation and could only grin dazily at John. Just before it became uncomfortable the little one clapped his hands and stood up, tugging at John. "Okay come on. We have to get breakfast. We have a very busy day."

His eyebrose rose expectantly.

[Dragon]

John's eyebrows rose too, almost in mirror image. He knew he had a busy day - at least, according to the schedule he'd already made in his head. He had a large stack of essays in mutations studies to grade, after which he was penciled in for a Danger Room training session, and then he was going to sit down in his office and draft a proposal he'd been kicking around for the last couple of days, something about tightening the school's perimeter security against an infiltration, or against truant students...

He decided before he went any further, he'd better find out what Ridley had in mind. "We do? What's on the agenda?"

[Ridley Rhee]

"Kung Fu Panda." Ridley answered with barely-concealed excitement. "An' the Statue of Liberty, an' Central Park - they have a zoo there - and then maybe the Empire State Buildin'. I'm afraid of heights but probably not if you're there.

"So we gotta hop to it!" It was a rather duplicitous comment for a boy still in his nightwear to make. Ridley tugged again on John's sleeve.

[Dragon]

John's mouth fell open - he had certainly not factored a trip to New York City into his plans for the day. Coping with this sort of spontaneity was going to take... well... some careful planning.

"Why don't," he said hesitantly, "why don't we start with breakfast and go from there? Do you think you could get dressed and meet me back here in about--" He checked the old-fashioned clock ticking on the bookshelf. "--ten minutes?"

[Ridley Rhee]

"I'll be back in five!" Ridley crowed, spinning in one fluid motion to race for the door. He skidded out, gripping the door frame and using it to slingshot around the corner, only to poke his head back in seconds later. The boy's eyes sparkled.

"Time me, Dad!" He chirped. Then he was off again, careening down the Institute's hallways.

As he'd expected, his mother had gone back to sleep and barely stirred when he yelled from his bedroom that he and John were going out, no girls allowed. He changed quickly into jeans and his favourite orange t-shirt, the one with the fighting dinosaurs on the front that he'd got at the museum. Beaming, Ridley grabbed his sneakers and ran out of the little suite. He paused briefly on the stairwell to pull one shoe on, before jumping down to the floor below and scrambling back to John's rooms.

The boy arrived breathlessly, hair sticking up in all directions and rogue shoe still in hand. Ridley glanced at the funny clock, but he wasn't real good at telling that sort of time yet. "How fast did I go? Were you countin'?"

[Dragon]

John leaned in from the bedroom, still buttoning up his shirt - a white one with a gray floral splash on the lower corner; Rainah Selvano had bought it for him last Christmas, and he was inclined to trust her fashion sense - and as he closed it over his chest, it just barely covered a trail of ornamental ink curling around his ribs.

"I couldn't quite grab a stopwatch," he said apologetically, "but that was more like four minutes. Do you run track?"

[Ridley Rhee]

Ridley beamed; he'd ran his fastest, 'specially for his Dad.

"I used to win all th'races at my old school!" He said enthusiastically, bouncing on the balls of his feet. The boy paused and squinted at the brief flash of tattooed skin. "Hey, what's that?!"

Ridley trundled over to John and without preamble pushed up the man's shirt, eyes going impossibly wide at the revealed art. Curious fingers traced the dragon design along John's ribs. It was mesmerizing in it's fluid shape, and Ridley half expected it to start moving.

"Wow." He breathed, walking his fingers up John's torso along the spine of the dragon. "When'd you get this?!"

[Dragon]

John was oddly startled by his son's sudden interest - he rarely thought of his tattoos anymore, which were very much a relic of a former life. Usually he wore an undershirt which covered them up, but he'd let his laundry pile up lately.

"I got this when I was seventeen," he said, and he turned so Ridley could see how it coiled around his back, then pulled back his shirt to reveal the dragon's head and claws rampant across his chest. "I was still living in North Korea then. I used to go by a nickname back then - Yong Sim Jang, or 'Heart of Dragon.' So I had this done."

[Ridley Rhee]

"Yong Sim Jang." Ridley repeated slowly, tripping a bit over the unfamiliar cadence. His eyes were brimming with youthful awe.

The boy pulled his hand away and lifted his own shirt, scrutinizing the unmarked flesh beneath. He looked up at John. "Can I get one?"

[Dragon]

"Ah--"

John beat down a mild panic attack and laughed nervously.

"I'm afraid you're far too young for a decision like that, Ridley," he said. "In fact... so was I."

He buttoned up his shirt to cover the coiling dragon, and he knew it was time to take charge of Ridley's itinerary.

"So, are you hungry? There are pancakes in the cafeteria today."

[Ridley Rhee]

Ridley's face showed his disappointment as he let his own shirt drop back down. It was quick to brighten though -- after all, John had merely said he was too young to get one now. That meant that there was nothing in the way of getting one later. He had a birthday coming up, and a tattoo would make an excellent gift.

Mollified, the boy nodded and patted his stomach.

"I'm starving! I've never eaten in a cafeteria before." Ridley dropped to the floor and pulled on his remaining shoe, tying the laces in a droopy bow. "Caryne used to cook breakfast for us. And sometimes Mum did but it was terrible."

He made a gagging noise as he got to his feet and buzzed by John's side.

[Dragon]

John laughed and tried to remember if he'd ever tasted Clarity's cooking before. He couldn't remember - come to think of it, he didn't even know if she liked to cook. By the time two people came together to have a child, you expected them to know a lot more about each other, but they'd been friends for a few years before Korea, and John had always been a private person, not terribly talkative, not very inquisitive. It dawned on him all over again how much work he had to do.

Soon, John was guiding Ridley through the school cafeteria. There was the usual assortment of scrambled eggs, breakfast meat (sausage today), cereal, and baked goods; John made sure Ridley took a serving of fresh fruit and then led him to a counter with an open griddle and a pitcher of batter. He showed his son how to grease the griddle with just a little butter and use a ladle to pour a perfectly round pancake.

In another seven minutes, they sat down at a window table with a veritable feast before them.

[Ridley Rhee]

He was a maple syrup man, Ridley discovered. Back home in George Town the pancakes had been much thinner than these were, like edible paper, spread with butter inside and sprinkled with cane sugar and cinnamon. They were good, but didn't hold a candle to the fluffy stack before him.

The boy was largely silent as he stabbed a forkful of syrup-drenched pancake into his mouth and chewed, eyes swirling in appreciation. He was halfway through his third before he showed any signs of slowing. Ridley set his fork down and smeared his finger through the puddle of syrup on his plate, licking it clean before he poked around in the small bowl of fruit to his left.

Cantaloupe and melon were cast aside in the search for better produce, which came in the form of half a strawberry. The boy popped it into his mouth - it tasted almost bland after his pancakes.

"Your school is very big." Ridley remarked as he twisted in his seat to get a better view out the window. "I bet you could get lost easy, sometimes. Wouldn't that be cool though? What if you found a secret lair like Charlie Bone did when he got sent to Bloor's Academy and there were eight hundred year old cats living down there?!"

Ridley's eyebrows shot up and he looked at John with a crooked grin. "That would be amazing!"

[Dragon]

John had no idea who Charlie Bone was, but he was pretty sure there weren't any eight-hundred-year-old cats (or was that eight hundred year-old cats?) in the Sub-Basement.

"You'll learn to find your way around," he said with a laugh. "Who's Charlie Bone? Is he from a cartoon?"

[Ridley Rhee]

"No, he's from a book. Mum's reading it to me. He has special powers. And Manfred has a sinister plan." Ridley drummed his fork on the tabletop. "But he's not a mutant - Charlie, I mean, not Manfred - or at least, I don't think he is. Maybe in the next book it'll say."

He wriggled a bit more in his seat and glanced at the little plastic watch around his wrist. It had taken him three months to get enough boxtops to send away for it. "How long does it take to get to the city from here?"

[Dragon]

"About forty-five minutes," John replied between bites of sausage. "Downtown is a little farther away, another fifteen minutes."

He wasn't sure he dared to ask about Ridley's plans for the day. He was still trying to work out how much of his own schedule he could drop for this unexpected family day.

Though as he watched his son eat, his own plans started to seem more and more expendable.