| Fragmentation | |||||
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| What: Former friends and teammates confront Shift over his actions. Friendships and trust are fragmented, but to some people, there are some clues as to why Kwabena seems to have changed so much. | |||||
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Late afternoon at Mutant Town. The whole place is dirty, crowded and smelly, as usual. Tourists stick to the main streets, where the cops actually pay some attention. But some of the best, or at least most interesting clubs and bars are pretty out of the way. Nate comes here often, either for business or for fun. Today is a bit of both, which involves keeping his telepathic 'ears' open. Something that is not pleasant in a city the size of New York. But sometimes there are unexpected benefits, like finding a telepathic 'sister' in the area he has not seen since last year. A brief psychic greeting followed by an invitation to a drink, or maybe an ice-cream, served to lure Rachel to his table. Or maybe the redhead wanted also to catchup with her non-quite brother's latest misdeeds.
Rachel's reason for being in Mutant Town is simple. She's stubborn. Last time she was here she got temporarily stripped of her powers and then tased. Her pride simply won't let her avoid the area. Not having any particular plan once she got here, simply mooching about rapidly became tedious - which made the unexpected telepathic contact from Nate particularly welcome. She's a little miffed with herself that he pegged her first, but that's what she gets for walking around with her shields closed tight.
Sliding in across from Nate at his table, Rachel seems to look at him thoughtfully for a couple of seconds before speaking. Not-quite-older-sister she might be, but she's still making sure he doesn't look any worse for wear than she thinks he should. "Hey, Nate." She finally says, with just the ghost of a smirk. "Been a while. Your news first or mine?"
Nate snorts, but looks pleased to see her nevertheless. He looks tired, and perhaps a little pale, sunglasses covering his eyes. "It has been a while, yeah. You have been pretty hard to find. I was starting to think you had left New York." News? Oh yes, so many of them... "hmm, my news are. Damn. I don't know where to start. Did you have a chance to meet Christ before he left? You know, our 'grandfather', the space pirate."
Rachel notes Nate's slightly drawn appearance, but doesn't pass comment - at least not yet. After all, she looks pretty chipper today, but it's not like she hasn't had a rough time of it lately herself. "I've been around." She says vaguely, and then Nate will feel her exert her telepathy, just a little, just enough to convince anyone who happens past that they're chatting about something so inconsequential that it's not worth paying attention to. Satisfied, she leans her elbows on the table and looks a bit rueful as she explains. "Finally realised this /isn't/ the past of my world. Wasted a lot of time looking for giant robot assembly lines that aren't where I remember them being." She shrugs, the rueful look replaced with something that looks a bit happier. "I gave up and moved into the school." She smirks at Nate again. "Should be easier to find now."
Rachel's eyebrows go up a bit in surprise at the first bit of Nate's news, and she shakes her head with a look of regret. "Now I wish I'd come home earlier." She says, disappointment in her tone, though it doesn't last too long. "But I hear you're looking out for Hope, now? I finally got her to stop running long enough to talk to her."
It's hot, very hot outside. The rain simply refuses to fall, and as the mid-afternoon temperature approaches its thermal zenith, many have taken efforts to stave the heat for but a time.
Kwabena is no exception. The African mutant is wearing only a part of his 'new' uniform, given to him by Magneto; a pair of black, skin-tight pants that seem to bear padding much resembling armor. What resembles a muscle-shirt (read: 'wife-beater') is worn on his upper body, though it's impossible to tell if it is part of this uniform, or its own item, given the belt of black circling his waist. Pouches with metal studs for clasps are worn on the belt, and with the pair of combat boots on his feet, he easily passes in this part of town as 'just another one of those mutant degenerate thugs' that like to hang around in places like Mutant Town.
Regardless, he's able to keep a low profile, given how many oddly dressed (not to mention oddly-colored and shaped) humanoids hang out around here. Stepping out of the sun, he reaches up to wipe some sweat from his brow, and quietly makes for the nearest bar.
"Whiskey, straight up, and a beer."
"What kind of beer?"
"Whatevah is de coldest."
The bartender nods his head at Kwabena, and moves off to fill the order.
"Hope? Now, talking about elusive redheads," Nate makes a vaguely hopeless gesture. "I try to look up for her, yeah, but she doesn't make it easy. She has no common sense. Also, she is too mysterious for her own good." Then, he notices the people around is not really hearing anything he is saying, and peers around psionically. "Nice trick. I gotta find time to... catch up with my telepathic lessons. I have not been by the school in almost a month." He goes quiet when he spots Kwabena, which is soon after he arrives, the seat he picked allows him to watch the entrances to the place. Then he directs Rachel a questioning glance.
Rachel laughs quietly to herself as Nate lumps her in the same boat as Hope and despairs of them both. "I'm glad someone else thinks that. I thought it was just me." Rachel's clearly amused, but adds, "Of course, there were three of us and only one of her." Just in the interests of fairness, before tilting her head slightly. "Still, she gave me the impression she wasn't running away from you /quite/ as hard as from the rest of us." Despite herself, Rachel looks pleased by her 'little brother's' compliment. "I need the practice." She replies honestly. "I have lessons with Jean. Seemed like a good idea at the time." Small stuff like this isn't quite the problem the big stuff is, though.
Rachel's feeling pretty good about chatting with Nate when something makes her stiffen a bit in her chair. There are plenty of voices around her, so she doesn't catch everything the man ordering drinks at the bar says, but she doesn't have to. The accent is enough. Nate, at least, will feel the trickle of telepathic energy emanating from Rachel increase dramatically as she draws heavily on her powers, and deep in her green eyes there's a flicker of flame. As Nate shoots her a look, Rachel reaches out toward the bar, tentatively, the lightest of light probes - and then she seems to slump a bit in her seat, letting go of the power she'd had primed. "There's something I need to tell you, later." She says quickly, and then twists around in her chair, draping one arm over the back and looking right at Kwabena.
Glass of whiskey, beer in hand. The whiskey goes down first, not bothering to take the time to really enjoy it. The beer, however, that one is a chaser. Kwabena takes a good pull, then sets it on the bar and makes to lean upon its edge, when he feels that stare.
It's not that he has any telepathic abilities, mind. The man has just gotten good at knowing when someone is staring at him. Something in his peripheral vision tickles his paranoia, and a simple glance to the left isn't enough to satisfy it. He turns just enough, and meets Rachel's gaze head on.
There is a brief moment of surprise, but only in the sense that he didn't expect to run into any former members of the X-Men quite so soon. The edge of his lip curls in a pleasant way, but then something stops him from following that thought of friendliness so soon. He seems, for a brief moment, confused. It passes smoothly, however, and after a brief glance toward Rachel's companion, he simply nods his head across the way to her in a silent greeting.
There's lots of ways to track a person. Electronically, psionically, tailing, informant networks, even good old scrying. Then there's Domino's approach. She just happens to be in the right place at the right time for the pieces to start falling neatly into place. The pale skinned patch-eyed woman steps in alongside some guy with brown hair and an easily forgettable appearance, making a line straight for the counter while tucking blue lensed shades onto her forehead as she goes.
Suddenly she's standing beside Kwabena, his back turned while he's making eye contact with Rachel.
In another moment she's ordering four bottles of beer, turning to rest her elbows back upon the counter as she waits. Then notices Nate (he's kinda hard to miss in a crowd.) Then..others. Then Shift.
She'll give that a 1 in 102,415 odds.
"Glad to see something hasn't changed about you, kid."
There's something that resembles 'pleased' upon the brunette's face. Perhaps it's in those deep brown eyes of his, or the spring in his step, and it looks very much like a (perhaps) one-sided animated conversation concluded just before the doors of the establishment were opened to allow for entrance.
To the bar then, with them, and wordlessly (for the moment), takes hold of two of the bottles. Now, however, he simply can't resist. "Nothing darker? We missed lunch.. und dinner. Chewy would be good."
There's a german cant to the words, a thick, possibly familiar sound to the cadence of his speech. Perhaps it's just the fact that his words are light and teasing.
"Something you can chew?"
Fully in the bar now, Kurt looks around the room from the bar. Straightening, or the image looking as if it is, brows rise at the familiar-ish faces of Rachel and Nate. That is, however, fully taken by the presence of Shift.
There's a darkness that seems to flicker in, obscuring his darkened, human eyes as he stares at the other man. It's not a greeting, per se. It's a .. identification.
"Kwabena."
Well. It's a good thing that the accent didn't belong to the man Rachel thought it did, or the image Nate slides into her brain would have put her right off her game. << Complicated doesn't sound like it begins to cover it. >> Rachel replies telepathically. It's just that bit quicker - and Rachel couldn't let that image go without saying /something/. << Sounds like we both have more news. >> She adds, even while she's watching Kwabena for his reaction to her presence. The nod gets a curving of just one of Rachel's eyebrows, a silent 'that's it?'. Considering how quickly the man was gone after what happened with the Inhibitor's cronies, she's not quite prepared to just nod back and return to her conversation with Nate. << I ran into our mutual friend again. >> Rachel's voice is in Kwabena's mind now, though she's helpfully left the door open for Nate to 'listen' in, if he so chooses. << It was even less pleasant than last time. >> In her mind, a memory flickers, a man tearing her powers away from her. Rachel's calm mental voice acquires a dark undertone as she projects those words, and the longer she looks at Kwabena, the more her eyes narrow curiously as she seems to study him. Considering she was half-expecting to see Isaac, even after her telepathic scan, it's his image that was in her mind as she turned, and now she compares it to the man in front of her... << Something tells me you're still interested in the details. >>
As it becomes clear that she's not the only one taking an interest in Kwabena's presence, however, Rachel shifts a bit in her chair, her lips curving into a slight smirk. Looks like she doesn't have first call on his attention. She'll let him off the hook for now, if he wishes, but now she's got a reason to find him. And Rachel can be annoyingly good at that.
Nate is just curious about Kwabena's presence, but Domino's arrival makes him tense visibly. "Crap," he mutters, reaching for... well, his cup of coffee. He had no time to ask for something stronger. Domino unnerves him out for reasons that are not really her fault. Baggage, of course. Rachel should know how it is given she is from the future... wait, not the future, now she is officially in exactly his same boat: coming from a parallel Earth. Also, the coffee has gotten cold, which is very unfair. And yet, the telepathic conversation seems to be interesting. Now he is curious. "What is going on?" He murmurs to Ray.
Understandably, Kwabena is startled by two familiar voices just behind him. He's developed a fairly cool nerve over the years, but as all of the unlikely encounters come together around him like a tightly wound spring, his attention upon Rachel is shattered. He spins about, perhaps a bit quicker than is usual for him, and looks at Domino.
Surprise forms a response, but it never finds a voice. The voice from the man accompanying her is familiar, but the visage? A man he doesn't know, speaking his real name? His mouth just hangs open for a moment as he looks between the two, not entirely sure what to say.
After a few moments, he clamps his mouth shut, only to open it again with an actual response. "Something," he answers, then looks beyond Domino toward the man next to her. He doesn't like the man's look, and his expression quickly grows combative. "Just who de hell ah-" he starts, when suddenly, there is a voice in his head.
Fingers curling yet tighter around his bottle, Kwabena's brow furrows with frustration. His eyes flick back over toward Rachel for a moment, silence taking him as her words continue to form messages in his head. It's enough to make a man seek out some way of blocking telepaths, if such a thing were damned possible.
<< I am, >> comes the flash of a mental response, but the telepath will quickly be able to ascertain how absolutely distracted his mind is. Eyes flash back toward Domino's companion before settling upon the patch-eyed mercenary once more. "Who's dat?"
If his voice weren't enough to tell Domino of his displeasure, the way he quickly tilts back the bottle to slug some more cold ale will surely do the trick.
There Domino stands, a thin smirk creeping across blackened lips as Kwabena struggles with the rapid shift in his surroundings. "Nice comeback."
With her own bottles in hand, one promptly getting a respectable portion of its life drained out of it, she looks back to Shift with way more amusement than she should probably be expressing at his discomfort. "What, you didn't think you were the only newbie in this gig that I took under my wing for a time?"
It's a lie, of course. She's not training an image induced Nightcrawler to be a mercenary.
She's been training the real one. Well, sorta.
"Looks like we've got some other buddies in the joint, what say we go have ourselves a little sit-down so you can kindly explain to me what the flipping hell you've been getting your smokey little hands into lately."
The look in her eyes would suggest that turning down the 'offer' would not be in the man's best interest though no obvious effort is made to enforce the idea. This decision she leaves for him to make, now approaching Rachel and Nate. Seems like things have been changing all over the place, Nate's discomfort with her appearance is also something unfamiliar and new to her. It's also something she chooses not to comment on.
"Howdy." She'll just invite herself if it's all good and well with the two, hooking the toes of an armored boot around the leg of a chair and sliding it on over.
To telepaths, it's not hard to 'see' that it's a top of the line Stark Industries image inducer that the one, the only, The Amazing Nightcrawler is using. Going out into public with blue fur and a demon tail isn't always the best. Sometimes? Sometimes it's nicer not to be stared at.
Kurt can't help but look back at Rachel and Nate, that niggling feeling that there's something familiar.. or familial about them?
Still, there's that darker anger that seethes in the hidden blue-bamfer, and those brown eyes flicker back towards Shift.
"You can't speak to me?" comes as a challenge. Kurt has his bottle in hand, and gestures towards Domino. "I thought you recognized her. Don't you know she never tells her business?" There's a pause in his words before he adds in a low growl, "Unless it is very necessary."
Still, the German takes his beer and swallows it in a few hefty draughts, and sets the bottle back on the table. "I have a very good idea of what it is. Und I would like it from his own mouth."
Rachel picks up on Kwabena's distraction easily enough - it's not much of a stretch, considering he's got four people looking at him - but she can also feel his annoyance with her, his desire for her to be out of his head. Considering how happy he was to use those very same powers for his own benefit not too long ago, not to mention his rather curt response, she doesn't feel particularly sympathetic to his irritation right now. << Glad to hear it. >> She projects in a dry tone.
Nate's quiet question draws Rachel's attention away from Kwabena, and she turns back in her chair to face him. "There's someone out there who can remove mutant powers." She replies in a low tone, words spoken swiftly. "He's dangerous and I've run into him twice." Rachel's quick rundown is accompanied by a mental image of someone who looks similar to Shift - not identical, but similar. It's only once Rachel's finished that she catches the hint of something bothering Nate, beyond the situation she's just mentioned. Rachel shoots him a questioning look.
Not that she gets chance to do any more than that, as Domino's approaching their table, and Rachel obligingly makes room for her to join them. Her eyes slide past the other woman to Kwabena and Kurt - not her Kurt, of course, but close enough - then flicker quickly back again. "Sure you should have left them alone?"
Nate had never taken a good look at Nightcrawler's mind, so it takes him hearing the German accent to recognize the older mutant. "Why are you disguised in Mutant Town, of all places?" He asks, sounding perhaps somewhat sharper than he would have wanted.
It is Domino's fault. No, really. Rachel's unvoiced question is answered with a shared memory:
It is a year ago. Bleak, barren land. Red, cloudy skies. The air smells to burned rubber and acid. This is the Age of Apocalypse, and rebels get hunted down like rabid dogs. Domino is the hunter. Nate is her prey.
Domino's team falls on Forge's cell without mercy. Nate's friends are killed left and right. And Nate attacks Domino. He is unskilled with his powers, so he tackles her. Of course Domino beats the crap out of him. But then she makes the mistake of gloating. Nate strikes her mind with the full force of his telepathic might and almost no control. He stabs her memories and personality like a knife going through rotten wood and burns everything in his path. Domino is a vegetable about ten seconds, before she dies with all her neurons burned to ash.
It was not this Domino. That woman was a sadistic monster that took pleasure in hunting down and murdering the few people still resisting Apocalypse's rule. Her mind is not the same. But she looks and sounds the same. And Nate had that wonderful experience no novice telepath should miss: dragging a mind into death and staring the whole time.
So yeah, he is unnerved by Domino being alive, talking and behaving like an almost normal human being. End memory.
"I need a drink," he comments bleakly.
Mis-matched eyes of brown and silver flick back and forth between Domino and 'Kurt', appraising the two as best he can. The former he considered a friend. The latter? Unknown. One thing's for certain, however. Kwabena does not like the German's attitude.
Glad to hear it. Rachel's voice again.
<< Lose the attitude, Red. I'm not your enemy. >> If only he had any idea just how hypocritical that sounds. Oddly enough, Kwabena seems to believe every bit of it.
All the while, Kwabena refrains from looking away from the German. "I can speak to whoevah de hell I want to," he answers, letting a strand of hostility slip into his quiet words. "Word of advice, 'schweinehund'? Keep your nose out of oddah peopah's business."
Scooting back the bar stool with his heel, Kwabena gives the German a good warning glare before turning and walking back over toward teh table. "Hey kids," he greets, addressing Nate and Rachel. "Keep chilling." His free hand reaches behind him, grabbing a free chair from another table and drawing it over with him. It falls onto the floor with two thuds, and he settles into it before turning toward Domino again.
"Smokey hands. Dat's nice. Your friend over dere's pretty smart, but if you think dere's a chance in hell I'm going to chat about anything aside from the sweat on my feet with a green around, you've lost your charm, Dommie."
A glance is given Nate's way, and he provides the man with a half-committed grin while lifting his own bottle for a pull.
With that 'I need a drink' from Nate's end Domino slides one of the two bottles across the table toward the guy. "Truer words have yet to be spoken."
Not that she has any idea what's on the poor guy's mind. The one time they had a proper sit-down she practically ripped into the guy with angst and accusations, all thanks to a few run-ins with Cable, himself. Wherever the heck he happened to run off to. Things like that a person doesn't readily forget. Nor anything dealing with the Age of Apocalypse. Fortunately she's completely oblivious to all of that, and she's used to weirding people out to boot!
With Rachel's inquiry she casually dismisses the matter, barely registering as a shrug. "They'll figure it out."
Hey, look at that. Shift decided to join them at the table. (Knew he couldn't walk away from that.) The albino kicks back in her chair, looking oddly smug with his oh so obvious irritation. "And you've lost your common sense if you think I'm sharing personal time with anyone more green than you. Looks can be deceiving, but you're no stranger to that, are you? Got a lot of people confused about you lately, though it'd seem that I was on that train before it went mainstream."
There's a spot left open beside her, waiting for he of the German persuasion.
"Do you know how it feels to be the son of a woman who allies herself with a man who causes the death of hundreds of souls?" The words are for Nate, in answer to his inquirly, but those brown eyes are on Shift, trying to guage a reaction. Kurt's eyes narrow, his voice low and growling. "To know that the woman has a hand in Sentinels who slaughtered innocents in the streets of New York City, indiscriminately?"
The calling names gives Kurt a moment before he laughs, but it's not a happy, amused one. "Schweinhund? Like the lady said, 'Is that all?'" Kurt leans forward, and whispers, "I have a great deal of experience with the likes of you, mein freund."
Nodding to Domino's words, there's a smile, and likely the telepaths can virtually see' the fangs showing beneath the veil of technology. "Do you really think so little of her that she would associate with someone 'green'?"
Kurt takes the second bottle, and it's an easy path to the seat offered, and he keeps hold of the drink. "Danke, liebling," he says softly in response to the seat.
Rachel might deserve the rebuke. Might. After all, Kwabena doesn't know the specifics of her last encounter with Isaac, or the debilitating consequences. But the redhead's not likely to appreciate that, nor being dismissed in favour of the standoff with Kurt. From a certain point of view, then, it's probably fortunate that Rachel's attention is suddenly swept away by a flood of memories from Nate.
She realizes what's happening at once, of course, mute observer to the horrific encounter though she is, and though she can't compete with him for raw power, she could shield her mind from him or pull away. But she doesn't - if he feels the need to share this memory, the least she can do is relive it with him. It's not the same as her experiences, at least he has the cold comfort of knowing he didn't kill an innocent... but she doubts he'd appreciate the difference of degree in what he did. As the rush of memory fades, Rachel exerts her own telepathic powers, and within his mind, within the memory, a red-headed figure materialises behind his beaten memory-form. It's just solid enough to reach out and squeeze his shoulder...
...before Rachel blinks quickly, twice, and she's back in the bar. "Yeah, but who'll pay for the damage?" She replies lightly to Domino, only slightly missing her cue. Like Nate, she feels like she could do with a drink as well. Of course, she now doesn't want to leave him with Domino. Not because she believes anything would happen, but because it would be cold. << So do I. >> She tells him quickly, instead.
As Shift joins them, Rachel nods to him, just as if the telepathic conversation hadn't taken place. "You seem to be keeping busy." She says lightly.
<<Ugh, sorry,>> he projects to Rachel. That memory-sharing could have been, and should have been, gentler. But Nate is still fumbling when he tries new things. And Domino just tosses him a bottle. Yay? "Thanks," he mutters, taking a long draught. To Kurt he just stares without understanding, resisting the temptation to pry into his mind to see what he is talking about. "Well. Not quite." As far as he knows his mother has never done anything murderous. Like eating stars with inhabited planets and things like that. "Although I am getting used to expect all kinds of... surprises from the family."
Where Domino and Kurt seem to be quite comfortable in their confrontation with him, Kwabena seems quite the opposite. His posture is back against the chair, like a poker player holding his hand far too close to the chest. That being said, the words spoken by the German are quite unexpected. The hostility that seemed to have been reserved for him begins to drain. It isn't until Kurt uses the words 'mein freund' so plaintively, however, that Shift's suspicions are confirmed.
A deep breath is drawn through his nose, and his posture visibly relaxes. Aforementioned hostility? Suddenly gone, but not quite friendly. Oh, he holds no ill will toward the masked Nightcrawler, but there's no more room for trust, either. "It would have sahprized me," is his answer to the last. For the moment, however, he's not about to acknowledge Kurt's other words. Not now, and perhaps, not here.
"I don't like to be bored," he fires back Rachel's way. It's dismissive at first, but he remembers his message to her, and looks over toward her to give her a proper bit of attention. "Glad to know someone's keeping an eye on de asshole for me," he quips, regarding Isaac.
Nate gets another look at his last remark, and he is summarily compared to Rachel. "Wait, you two ah..." Beat. "Nevahmind. Don't tell me."
"He will," Domino replies to Rachel's question while thumbing over to where Shift seats. "Guy's just made of money these days, do you know what he paid me for my last job?"
For a woman that won't even tell other people what brand of deodorant she prefers it's a major thing for her to bring up, even in passing. Everything for a purpose, however.
Leaning forward with half gloved fingers laced together she gives Shift quite a lot of her attention. "Glad to see life as a bad guy is working out for you better. Those kids still hiring?"
"Oh," Dom pauses while lightly running a ghostly white fingertip through the condensation on her bottle, "and what were you planning on doing with that data we recovered, anyway? Seems to me that this all comes full circle, here. Sentinels on Staten Island. Genosha getting overthrown. Sentinels in Times Square. Data on an advanced Sentinel design. And oh hey, look at this. We're back on Staten Island again, not a stone's throw away from where it all began. Do you know what those odds are? Because I can tell you."
Stare. (Ignore this, jackhole.)
"My family never ceases to amaze me," Kurt offers softly, his hands staying on the bottle. "Do you know how embarrassing it is to be stopped in the streets of Mutant Town, asking if I could 'take them home'?" Or just asking to touch him. Put in a kind word with the Imperator, because certainly He'd listen to someone that looked so much like Mystique, yes?
And then the soft whispers of perhaps he IS a Prince of sorts from Genosha?
Denials.
More than three times, if that's what it takes!
Though, trust? Anger. Betrayal. There will be a part of the hidden elf that will mourn the loss of trust, but now? Anger. Betrayal. And the fact that the man USED a woman he considers a friend. Someone that Shift declared friendship.
Now, however, with Domino piping up, Kurt sits back to take a swallow of the second beer, his hidden tail whipping behind him. The movement of air, however, could probably be gently felt. Or is that the fan?
There's no way that Rachel would take Nate to task for projecting that memory to her. Not after she dragged her room-mate into one of her nightmares a little while ago. Rachel adds another item to the growing list of things she needs to talk to Nate about. Later. When there aren't three other people at their table who all seem to have metaphorical knives out for at least one other person. "Depends what he had you doing, I guess." Rachel remarks to Domino, not really expecting specifics but giving it a try anyway. She's got the nagging feeling that she should perhaps be extricating herself and probably Nate as well from this situation, but there's clearly a great deal going on that she doesn't understand.
When Shift is again curt in his response to her, Rachel has to wonder if he's trying to alienate her as well - but then she gets something a little more conciliatory from him. "For all the good it's doing us." Rachel almost mutters to herself, but then she looks up as if she's about to add something - except that Domino's on a roll now. << This is where you tell me you're not /really/ in as much trouble as it sounds like you are. >> Rachel says into his mind, not really giving a damn whether it irritates him more than it already has. << Or that you are, and you need help getting out of it. >> There was a hint - not much, but a hint - of flippancy about the first message. The second is utterly serious.
And just as if she /wasn't/ trying to carry on a second, silent conversation, Rachel snorts as Kwabena looks between her and Nate. "Somehow I think you've figured it out." She tells him. Her eyes move to Kurt, aware that there's a great deal that she's missing, and unsure what she can say.
There is a bit of family resemblance between Ray and Nate, yes. It is pretty obvious when they are together like this. But he is letting her to carry with the conversation, since he is ingesting in his own little world and actually has little idea of the coming and goings of the X-folks lately.
Well, until someone mentions those oh-so-hated giant robots.
"Sentinels," Nate's eyes focus back into the people around him, and he straightens in his chair. "What is going on? Someone let Trask go free? Who is building them now?"
There were a lot of things that Shift could stomach. Being called a bad guy wasn't really one of them.
At first, his eyebrows shoot upward when Domino not only blows open that he hired her for a job, but comes close to actually showing them the price tag. Oh, she has his attention again, that's for certain, but when she calls him a 'bad guy'? Those eyebrows shoot downward, and he scowls.
There's a reason Kwabena has been especially broody lately, and those reasons are close to coming to the surface. Domino's continued claims, however, bring a bristling to his frame again. "You think I knew dat attack was being planned?" he answers, leaning forward somewhat in response to her stare. "You think I knew she was involved?" His hand gestures Kurt's way, indicating his mother by sheer gesture of proxy. "Dose are some heavy accusations to be coming from friends."
The last word is spat forth with no shortage of venom.
Drawing back, Kwabena visibly keeps his anger at bay through the tightening of his jaw. He tilts back the bottle, draining it of the last remnants of his beer, just in time to catch a wandering server. Reaching out, he catches her attention with a gesture, saying, "Get a round for de tabah. It's on me." Out comes a $50 bill, which he casts upon the table with the kind of distaste one reserves for unwanted blood money.
When it comes to telepaths, Kwabena has had his fair share of experience. << I am. >> It's an admission, and enough of one to possibly satisfy her concern. << But it's probably best you keep out of it. The X-Men don't want any part of it. Your own mother made that clear enough to me. >>
In spite of the bitterness that lingers upon Kwabena's soul, something unique happens when Shift thinks about Jean Grey. To any other telepath, it would likely go completely unnoticed. However, there is something to be said about familial connections. When Jean skims the surface of his subconscious, something else is there with it, something that draws at Rachel's telepathic attention with an odd sort of familiarity. Should she look hard enough, Rachel of all people will be able to see it, like the subtle signature of a graffiti artist claiming his work with a unique swipe of the arm.
Jean Grey has been meddling with Kwabena Odame's memories.
What she did, exactly, is so surgically precise that it's impossible for anyone save Charles Xavier himself to understand it. But it's there, as if fragments of his memories have been stitched together using Jean's favorite color of thread.
"Yeah," he says absently toward Rachel and Nate. "Save de cliffs notes for latah." Nate gets more of his attention then. "I don't know about that," he answers, "but de remnants of Trask's work might be worse dan de reality of his machines."
"I don't know what to think anymore, kiddo," Domino replies without a hint of emotion masking her own words. "You've changed. You've changed, and now you're running around hiring people for a raid like this, lugging a fancy new piece of ordnance, calling in skilled hands of the likes I've never heard of before. When it comes to mercenaries, I know people. Your archer friend is no merc."
"So go ahead, put the pieces together. The timing's awful close. The subject matter's the same. Maybe you don't know what you're doing anymore but I'm willing to bet that I could tell you. You're giving Magneto research data on the Sentinel Project. Let that simmer upon your conscience for a spell, friend."
Dom finishes her one remaining bottle then slips out of her chair, stepping back to the bar for something that'll hit a lot heavier than a brew.
"What did you do with the research from the Sentinel lab, Shift?" Kurt leans foward again, those brown eyes narrowing. It's strange to see pupils within those orbs, and straight, white teeth in a mouth where there should be pointed canines.
Looking to Nate, Kurt nods. "We took out Trask last year.. und brought him home. We handed him off to the JLA to face justice. Since then, there have been numerous attacks by Sentinels." Gesturing toward Shift, the anger is there, seething. "Ask him. His was the latest."
Though, Kurt is more than happy to fill in the blanks. "I had been sent a message to go to Barpha Narka.. where there were machines. War machines. Not Sentinels, but.. some sort of hybrid? The two before this? The Sentinels came und took Magneto, Mystique, und several other innocents, even firing upon non-mutants. They went to Genosha.. und, well.." There's a smile that creeps, but it's not a pleasant one. "Magneto is now in charge of the island. Und.. surprising? The latest attack in New York City was by Sentinels that fired upon everything. Not just mutants. In fact, there was no desire to target them." He'd had a hard time being targeted, but he found out later -why-. Or why he expects.
That won't be a good conversation with Mother.
"Jean felt Mystique's hand in it."
Kurt looks to Domino now, and he nods his head slowly, echoing Dom's thoughts. "Do you have the rosary?"
Do you pray anymore? And if you do.. to whom?
Rachel reaches out for Nate's mind, even as Shift reacts strongly to Domino's accusations. << I have no idea what the hell's going on. >> She tells him frankly. << But I'm starting to think we /need/ to know. >> Shift's right about one thing - those are some heavy accusations being thrown around, and while the smart move might be to walk away before she hears something she'll have to act upon, Rachel's not moving. Besides. Nate said it. Sentinels. As she told him before the others arrived, the knowledge she brought back from her own timeline hasn't been much use tracking them down, but her blood still runs cold whenever they're mentioned.
Rachel's not really expecting a response from Kwabena, but despite her surprise, she's got a decent poker face. << She's not /actually/ my mother. >> Rachel tells him, though how she /really/ feels about this Jean Grey is a lot more complex. << And it wouldn't be the first time I pissed off the real one, either. >> She still can't reconcile Shift turning up to pull her and Doug out of trouble with what's being suggested here. The trouble is, even as she's making her reply, Rachel's sensing... something else. Something that makes her look more closely at Shift's mind. And, well, her use of telepathy has always been driven more by necessity than ethics. But even so, what she finds makes her feel... ill. It's one thing for her to meddle where she knows she shouldn't, but Jean? Rachel holds her dead mother to an unachievable standard, and that's transferred to this world's Jean Grey as well.
Rachel's gone quiet, as the accusations and denials swirl around her, her expression bleak.
Nate has problems thinking in Magneto as anything else than the revered ideologist of peace and harmony between humans and mutants he was in his world. He should have gone to Genosha when he felt that nuke explode. But his instincts were saying 'Magneto is there, what could possibly go wrong?' "Did I ever tell you Magneto was the leader of the X-Men in my world and the leading advocate among mutantkind for a peaceful coexistence with humans? I have difficulties picturing him as problem. Much less... building Sentinels."
Not being part of the telepathic conversation between Rachel and Shift, Nate has missed the memory-tampering bit. But lets be realistic, he wouldn't have recognized the tampering if he had seen it, anyways.
It says a lot that Kwabena isn't turning over the table and getting destructive. Rachel and Nate being here is probably to thank for that.
"Yeah," he says to Domino. "I've put de pieces togedah. And you know what? I'm in a position to find out what de hell is really going on here." He leans over toward Domino before she departs, scowling. "I did a job. Nothing more. Remembah dat."
Once Domino has left, he turns toward Kurt. "It was a job. I turned in de information. Collected what data was given to me, and am following some few leads I have on dat." It's an answer, to be sure. "If I tell you more, dere will be consequences. You can undahstand dat." Taking note of Kurt's information, he leans back into his seat and gratefully accepts the beer that is brought to him, tilting it back in order to take a healthy swig of its contents. Like Domino, it's not nearly enough, but he'll hold off on hitting the flask for another moment. After that, he simply gives Kurt a knowing expression, for he's piecing a few things together in his own mind. Nothing more needs to be said.
Before he can say much more, however, Kwabena turns toward Nate with a frown. "Magneto is a friend of humans in... in 'your world'?" He speaks the last two words as if this was a foreign concept to him. "I don't undahstand. De Magneto I know? Not a fan of humans." His fingers curl around the bottle of ale, and he goes silent for a moment or two, while considering his own opinion of the matter.
"Not dat I blame dem. Humans don't undahstand de way we work. Dey... dey don't trust us. When push comes to shove... dey would see us die."
Shift has never used words like that. To people such as Domino and Kurt, especially, they might notice an odd change in his demeanor when speaking of humans. It is with a certain derision that he uses the term, as if he himself had been turned against them.
To Kurt, he turns at last, fingers curling ever tighter around his bottle of ale. "What good is it, Kurt?" he asks. "God forsake us a long time ago."
Kwabena's last word in edge-wise to Domino is responded to in kind, "We all did."
She comes back just in time to catch his words regarding humans seeing them all die. It's a fairly radical departure from the norm with the guy, she files it away for the moment but leaves it to rest. Instead she replies to Nate. "Yeah, well in my world things are starting to look a whole lot more bleak as the days go by." It's said as she sets a handful of shotglasses and a bottle of Jameson whiskey on the table, free for all included it would seem.
"Funny. I'm not feeling a whole lot of trust toward you these days, either," she asides to Shift while pouring herself a shot then passing a questioning look toward Nate and Rachel, in case they wish to partake in the ignitable stuff.
"Here's the bottom line. Sentinels affect all of us. I don't care that you're off looking into matters, but keep in mind that whatever you're doing out there also affects all of us. Every person sitting at this table has reason to be concerned about the subject. Casually brushing it off is no excuse. I've done plenty of horrible things just because they were another job, doesn't mean I shouldn't be held accountable for any of them."
With that said she looks back to Nate and Rachel once again, bluntly asking "Good networking today?" She can hazard a guess, though that's about all she can do where psychics are concerned.
"Have you read the news, mein Herr?" Kurt sounds.. dumbfounded as he looks to Nate, and Rachel. "He has set himself up as 'Imperator' of Genosha. He levelled a mountain, killing hundreds of people in the single action. Now, he und mother say, 'They were Humanity First..' und 'It was a strike for a war that we didn't start'." And he doesn't sound the least bit supportive of such an undertaking. "They hold 'court' in their town, und standing beside him are a little mutant," here, Kurt looks at Shift, "Named Strilka. Who is my mother's protege.. und another named Omega Red. A beastial thing that Magneto keeps around to keep fear in the hearts of his people."
Kurt exhales softly, and he reaches with the hand that holds his bottle to his forearm, and touches it. Shimmering for a moment, there comes the form and figure of someone that everyone at the table would recognize. The fuzzy, blue, glowing golden-eyed teleporter. The expression his features carry is the same, if not deeper, than the one on the 'regular, plain' face.
"He is not the man you know." Kurt offers a somewhat sad smile; putting those pieces together slowly. After all, his 'daughter' is from another dimension. Another history. "Then again, I don't know who I am in your experience." There comes a moment when those glowing yellow eyes gleam, and he simply can't help himself. He can't.
"Other than being incredibly handsome, und dashing. A wonder with the ladies."
Shift's words.. It was a job. That.. that right there.
"You have damned the human race, Kwabena," Kurt whispers. "Do you remember what I told you? Because you can does not mean you should."
Kurt shakes his head at the pronouncement of God's departure, and he leans towards the table, his tones low and intent. Maybe he can get through to the man, but.. maybe he can't.
"He has not abandoned us. He is exactly where we LEFT HIM. It is we that stray. Not Him." And it's a point of faith that the blue elf believes in utterly. Completely. "He finds the good men to fight the right battles at the right time."
Kurt stares at Kwabena now, those glowing eyes riveted. "Not dat I blame dem." He repeats. "Blacks don't understand the way we work. They don't trust us. When push comes to shove, they would see us die." His words continue, and in a single word, sums it up. "Fear." Those golden eyes narrow, and there's a smile that creases that fuzzy face, but it's not filled with a lightness of being. "Don't tell me I don't know what that feels like. Ever. But I can find a way to believe there are good men. Und that there are those who may find they're on the wrong path, and possibly wish to change it."
Kurt looks to the glasses at Domino's return, and looks up to smile at her. Now that he's truly blue once again. His tail pulls the chair for her to sit easily before bringing it to rest beside him. Whiskey.. looks good. Particularly from where he's sitting.
But.. did she really say that? Really?
Time for a three-fingered facepalm.
It's Nate's voice that brings Rachel back from wherever her thoughts have taken her. Talking about Magneto as leader of the X-Men. There's a flash of memory, an older Magneto in a wheelchair, telling her what she had to do - but then the memory splinters. It's been happening more and more lately, memories that don't fit with what she thinks she remembers of her life before she came here. The shock of the impossible memory shattering is like a bucket of cold water to the face. Part of her wants to back up what Nate says, but she doesn't trust the memory.
She lets the others speak, Kwabena earning himself a sharp look for his noticeably anti-human stance, while Domino's offer of whiskey gets a quick shake of her head. Kurt almost gets some reassurance about who he was in Rachel's world, but in the end she keeps silent. Its only when the others have spoken that she adds, as simply as she can, "In the end, it doesn't matter if 'we' hate 'them' or 'they' hate 'us'. It doesn't matter who strikes first, or who's left standing at the end. If it comes to open war between human and mutant, there are no winners. Both sides lose. I've seen it. And if we can't work together to stop it? We'll be just as guilty as those working together to /start/ it." Rachel's starting to feel a little claustrophobic, and her chair scrapes back as she begins to rise, only to be arrested by Domino's question.
Rachel completes the motion in a slower, more controlled manner, meeting Domino's gaze. "Tell me. If three people like you turned up at /your/ table and had /this/ conversation, and you could do what I can do, wouldn't YOU be asking the guy sitting next to you what the hell's going on?" True, that's not ALL she's been doing, but it's close enough. She looks to Nate. "I need to get out of here." She tells him, silently offering him an out if he wants it, and makes for the door.
"Oh, I don't believe anything I hear in the news, particularly anything concerning mutants," replies Nate, giving Kurt half a smirk. "I have been there myself. Some weeks I am a terrorist, other weeks I am some kind of super-hero. Guess what? They are making up shit both weeks."
But he can't thrust Magneto being anyway as he remembers. This is another world. Most people are different, most seem to be better. Some are bound to be worse. It gotta be one of those karmic things. He will have to talk with Magneto and find the truth.
"And you are wrong, Kwabena. Most humans do not hate us. I am a telepath and I know this. But most humans are not going to move a finger to help mutants against the small, vocal minority that hates us, if they think mutants hate /them/. And that seems to be what the news are selling this week. Think about it."
Rachel feeling sick is gets him too. He finishes his beer and stands up. "Wait a sec, I am going too." He looks pained as he moves out. Oh, he has not even told her about the fun of getting poisoned by Asgardian pointy-eared creeps. But he guesses the redhead has had his daily dose of brotherly trouble. Maybe even the yearly dose.
Kwabena is quick to snatch up the bottle of Jameson when it is is provided, pouring himself more than an ample shot. The amber liquid fills it to the brim, and he downs it without sparing any hesitation. Sadly, it was a comfort, where other comforts were fleeting.
To Kurt, he looks next. Knowing that Strilka was Mystique's protege is another piece of an ever changing puzzle. That with the knowledge that the whole coup de grace may have been fabricated has him unsettled, to say the least. And yet, the clever manipulation of Jean Grey has set him on a path that is, shall we say, aligned to magnetic north. Poetic, if not unfortunate in its own right.
Kurt gets his attention in short order. "I have only done what was deserved," he answers. "Magneto showed an interest in me." His words come silently next, for he made a promise not to destroy the cover of the X-Men, and it was a promise that was not affected by Jean Grey's surgical alteration of his memories. "When de chips fell, de X-Men did not." It would seem, if only for a moment, that he agrees with Kurt's worldview. The humans fear them. They have a reason to.
With Domino's return, Kwabena seems sobered, in spite of the whiskey he's taken. He leans toward her, fixing her with the gaze of his mis-matched eyes.
"I would nevah seek to hurt you."
As if that were a comfort. Poor Kwabena. In his effort to spy on the Brotherhood, he has unleashed a world of conflict that he couldn't have imagined. It's tearing apart his friendships. They may not know it now, but Kurt and Domino were two of the people he used to trust the most.
Rachel's position on impending conflict is duly noted. He looks toward her, a flash of concern showing upon his face, but it is short lived. "Conflict may be inevitable," he says. Given what he's learned hear today, it's a fair enough assessment of the situation at hand.
A numbness seems to take him. Absently, Kwabena lifts the bottle of beer, taking another hearty swig before leaving it on the table, unfinished. "Dere are some unfinished affairs dat need attended to." He scoots his own chair back, expression blank. For Kwabena, there is nothing more that needs to be said. If anything, this encounter has proven to him that he is truly alone in this twisted world.
"Yeah," answers Kwabena to Nate. "I'll believe dat when dey stop pointing dere guns our way." Walking toward the door, the African pulls a pack of smokes from his pocket. This one was a long time coming. As he departs, the click of a zippo follows him.
"I'm not blaming you," Domino responds to Rachel's question. "Just wondering if you're all having a good conversation since I have no idea what you're thinking about. Cheers," she finishes while lifting her shot between thumb and middle finger, downing it in one pass.
She can't help but listen when Nate says her piece, though she makes a point to gasp in mock exaggeration at one point along the way. "The man swears! Fantastic, time for round two." True to her word, one more shot gets poured out for herself.
Maybe she just wanted an excuse to drink more. 'Oh look, it's ten fifteen! Here's a cause for celebration.'
"Be safe out there, you two."
And then she's rolling her eyes. At Shift. Who else? "Magneto's interested in anything with a damned x-gene, idiot. With these new tricks you seem to be learning about yourself every other week then no shit he's going to take interest in you. Congratulations, you're becoming another commandable WMD."
When he mentions that he would never seek to hurt her she pins Shift with a pale blue stare once more, asking "Would you say that for everyone else at this table?"
Unfinished affairs? "No shit. Figure out which side of the fence you wanna play on so that I can figure out whether I want to hurt you or not."
That said she downs shot number two and lays claim to the bottle, glancing back to the now blue mutant seated beside her. "Tab's covered and I've heard all I need to hear, let's bamf."
"Gute Nacht, fraulein," Kurt rises from his seat when Rachel makes her moves to depart. "Safe journies," because, well, the elf has no idea where she's headed. All he wishes is that she get there safely.
Nate's basic offer to accompany her is met with a nod, and he begins to return to his seat. That shot glass needs filling! "It is as I believe. Fear rules the day. Und the insistance that we are in some way superior." But, the elf is done. Done with arguing. Now? Drinking.
"He's shown an interest in me, too, Kwabena. I am not there, nor do I do as he commands," is given softly. "Und you cannot say that it is because I am in another fold." X-Men will not be mentioned specifically. But, he has noticed the lack of action against Genosha coming from the Mansion, and he has no idea why.
Kurt does look up the man that he'd called friend; the man for whom he'd acted as father/confessor. "If it was the only way to stop you, mein freund? I would do what had to be done." But he's said that to Wolverine, too.
Or die trying.
When Shift begins his departure, Kurt makes the sign of the cross- without the shotglass in hand and murmurs the benediction.
After all have departed, Kurt, too, rises to his feet when Domino finishes her shot, but has the bottle in hand. He smiles, and holds out a hand for her. A smile comes to his face to look at her, and he nods.
"Let's bamf."