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Ava takes Saber.
*
Saber has left.
*
One of the windows at O'Rourke's bar is under repair. There was an odd altercation here just a few days ago, with some sort of shady government agency taking in two of the patrons. One of them went through the window. Harry - the bartender - was not pleased. So Ava, who was in attendance when that all happened, has stayed away from the bar for a few days. After all, they're not likely to have any pick up work when they're spending money on repairs.
But she also wants to make sure she can still find the occasional job here. So she's come back, and she's killing time at an empty table, looking over the menu as if there's something she's actually going to order.
She's been doing that for the last forty-five minutes, give or take.
*
Scott Summers is walking by with a group of friends and notices someone he thinks looks familiar through one of the windows. "Guys," he says as he slows down. "Guys, I gotta head in here. I think I see someone I know." They say their goodbyes and Scott ducks into the bar and walks up towards the table to see if he was indeed correct. "Ava?"
*
Ava looks up from the menu when she hears her name, brows rising at the source. "Scott," she says, surprised, leaning over to slip the menu back into the space between the napkins and the wall. "Hi." She twists, looking out the unboarded part of the window before she turns back to him. "What, uh- I didn't realize you were from Brooklyn?"
*
"Nah, I live upstate a bit. Westchester County. Just hanging with some friends down here in Brooklyn to create some havok." Pun totally intended. "Gotta keep busy, right? Speaking of, if you're busy with something or someone, I can jet. Not a problem."
*
"No, I was just…" Ava could certainly lie here. It's what she does. What she's trained to do. But why? "I was just hanging around waiting to see if Harry'd have some work tonight," she admits, smile slipping crooked with a shrug. "But it's looking like chances are slim. There was a big thing a few days ago," she nods toward the window. "And, you know. Insurance only covers so much."
*
"Have some work?" Scott asks as he turns over his shoulder with hands buried in coat pockets as if he's trying to find the work. "You mean, like bouncing? You take people out or something?"
*
Ava smirks, shaking her head. "Mostly I wash dishes," she replies, leaning over to get a look toward the kitchen. "Sometimes I bus tables or take out the trash. They don't need it all the time here, but as long as I don't make a mess of the place, it pays for dinner. I might even get to keep a tip or something, if people are feeling generous. Westchester? I was up there are few weeks ago picking up some donations for the Y. Pretty place."
*
"Look, I don't want to sound like a dick," Scott immediately thinks about half of his classmates, who would totally say that he's a dick. "But I mean, I'm lucky in that I just sold a car I restored…if you want some money to eat or something, I'd be happy to give you some."
*
"I'm not sure dick is the word you're looking for," Ava laughs. "And that's…well-intentioned, but I do just fine. Thanks, but keep your money." She starts to slide out of the booth, tipping her head toward the door. "Want to go for a walk?" Maybe it's a bit of a dodge for the charity offer, but it doesn't look like the place is going to be all that busy tonight.
*
"It isn't?" Scott asks. "I thought it was pretty apt," he adds before he joins her side. "Didn't mean anything by it, just an offer." As she leads and they go outside, "Which way we headed?"
*
"That's why there's nothing 'being a dick' about it," Ava points out as she steps outside. "You want to do something kind." She takes a right out of the bar, walking along the sidewalk with her hands in her pockets. "If I thought you pitied me, I might take offense. But I don't think you're silly enough to pity me, so." She shrugs, smile flickering.
*
"No, I think you'd probably electrocute me if I did that," Scott says with a grin. "So, you're from Europe, clearly. Sounds like Russia. Do you like it here?"
*
"Russia, yes," Ava nods. "Although I've been here since I was nine. I think the accent is not bad, given that. Although," she arches a brow over at him, "It is worse when I am…stressed." Running from assassins and snipers will do that. "As for liking it?" She shrugs again, looking up at the buildings. "It's all right? I guess? If you watch the news, it's always about how America and Russia can never get along, how different they are. It's really not that different. The government is more present in Russia, I guess. But…that could just be my experience."
*
"Can never get along with Russia. Humans can never get along with mutants," Scott mutters as if he's heard it all before. "The news reads what they can sell. The soul is more important than the advertising dollar. I'm optimistic for the future."
*
Ava seems amused by that. "You think Russia is maybe not so bad as the news says," she guesses. "Whereas I think America is not actually so different. They just…maybe hide things better. Lie about them a little bit more. Make it look prettier."
*
"Norman Rockwell never did a Mutant Town painting," Scott says absently as they walk along. "I think half the reason we hide things is so that we can convince ourselves that the lesson we were taught as children, to share, isn't as important as good people thought it was." Pause. "Gotta get that dollar."
*
"Sharing?" Ava quirks a brow, continuing down the sidewalk. "That is…complicated. We were always taught that sharing was the right thing, of course. We use our gifts, we give our lives, for the state. For our countrymen. Here, though, it sometimes seems as though appearing the right way is the most important thing of all. And for those with money here, it's about showing everyone else they have it. Because that's the American dream, isn't it? That anyone can have everything if they just work hard enough. But no one buys the dream if they don't see that it works every now and then."
*
"Well, what I mean is we talk about sharing alot, but the idea that we would share money with the poor is enough to make some people faint. It's amazing that FDR got elected so many times. Guess things regress the farther you get from trauma and tragedy." Scott raises his eyebrow, "So what made you come here?"
*
Ava laughs at the question. "I didn't actually have much choice in it." She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, considering him for a moment. How much to share? How to spin it? "When I was a girl, my parents worked for the government. Scientists," she explains. "But the department they worked in was…unethical to say the best. Some American forces took it down. My parents…" She catches the inside of her cheek between her teeth. "The program had made them disappear before then. When it was over, the Americans brought me back here."
*
"Wow," Scott says sadly. "I'm sorry." He sighs a bit trying to think of the new words to push the topic to something different. But he can't. "They brought you here and just left you? Like…welcome to America!"
*
"Not quite? But it felt like it." Ava leans down to pick up an abandoned food wrapper, tossing it into the trash can in front of a store. "They weren't sure what the program had done to me. The effect of whatever…experiments. So they kept me in observation. Which eventually became less observation and more…holding. So on my fourteenth birthday, I broke out. And I've been on my own since then. More or less."
*
"Well, I know you seem to not like being helped, but if you need it don't hesitate to ask. My parents left me and my brother a good deal of money. At least enough to go to college and live comfortably for a while. I don't mind helping you out if you need it."
*
Ava's smile quirks as she looks back at him, bemused. "Scott. I've been on my own since I was fourteen. If I was going to need help, I probably would have needed it before now," she points out. "I do all right. There are places. I take odd jobs. I resist the urge to turn to a life of super-crime." She pauses, teasing. "Mostly. I still consider it, I hear it pays well."
*
"Crime doesn't pay," Scott says earnestly. "Except for drug running. That pays. And insurance fraud. But, crime mostly doesn't pay."
*
"Is that what you are afraid of?" Ava presses, smile spreading. "If you don't save me, then surely I'll turn to evil. Take my skills and sell them to the highest bidder." The smile fades a bit as she looks away, the truth in the words all too clear. "Sometimes I suspect that's what everyone is the most afraid of, honestly."
*
"I try to save everyone," Scott says. "That's my weakness, I think. That and obsession." Scott twists his mouth, "I'm sorry. You obviously know what you're doing."
*
Ava shrugs, shaking her head. "It's all right. That wasn't fair to you, either. My first thought is that people either want to use me, or are afraid of me. It's what I grew up with. But it isn't very fair to people who just honestly want to help." She's quiet for a moment, then clears her throat, taking her own turn at changing the subject. "What are you obsessed with?"
*
"You mean aside from the Yankees?" Scott turns his head as if trying to think. "Pretty much anything. Anything I become devoted to, it's sort of an all out thing. I'm kind of all or nothing."
*
"I went to a baseball game once," Ava smiles faintly. "Right after they brought me here. A ball game. A trip to the supermarket. And a trip to Macy's. It was…very long."
*
"The baseball game, the supermarket or Macy's? Or all together? Guess they were trying to make sure you're a real American, right?" Sctt grins at the idea of how Ava would need to be indoctrinated into America.
*
"I am reasonably certain that was precisely their intent, yes," Ava laughs. "But since we went back to their…" She waves a hand vaguely. "Campus after that and I never left again, it was a little bit of a wasted effort. And the ball game was long. Macy's was bewildering. The supermarket too. So many things, so many choices."
*
"Do you remember who was playing?" Scott asks what must be an odd question. "I've never been one for shopping, to be honest."
*
"Me neither," Ava shakes her head. "If it works, it's good enough. Why there need to be twelve shades and four patterns of the same thing, why one inch in a skirt or a heel matters…It's frivolous, to say the least." The question about the ball game gets a long moment of thought. "Well, it was here, so one team had to be the Yankees, yes? But I don't know who the other team was."
*
"Well, back then it might have been the Dodgers or the Giants, depending on how long ago it was. They both moved about six years ago." Scott nods, "Couldn't agree more with you about the shades and patterns."
*
"Nine years ago," Ava answers. "It didn't help that no one actually explained the game. And it is an odd game. And," she adds quickly, raising a hand, "I am not going to say there is a better game in Russia. We actually don't play games in Russia. We just work. All the time. No fun. Only training in things." Is she…joking?
*
"I've heard hockey and soccer are big there, but obviously I don't know a whole heck of a lot about it." Scott tilts his head, "What do folks do for fun there?"
*
"We are Russian. We do not have fun." Ava casts a sidelong glance from beneath a curtain of hair, checking his reaction to that before she smiles slowly. "We read, we talk, we tell stories. We dance. I used to take ballet lessons, before. Swan Lake," she muses. "My mother used to sing it to me when it was time to sleep."
*
Scott can't help but smile, "You must be a lot like people from New Jersey, then." He perks for a moment when she talks about dancing, but then it's ballet. There goes that idea. "You should take it again, someday."
*
"Maybe," Ava shrugs. "Ballet is…one of those skills that if you're going to be good at it, you have to start young and you have to never stop doing it. You don't become a ballerina late in life. But lessons…might be nice. I still take fencing lessons at the Y."
*
"Because, naturally, you need to be good with swords given that you have electricity powers," Scott says with a grin. "Greedy."
*
"I was actually taking the fencing lessons before the electricity powers," Ava laughs, rueful. "The powers are…very new. Only the last six months or so. I'm still figuring out how they work. I don't entirely control them. It's like…It's something that lives inside me now. I always have to hold it back."
*
"That sounds a lot like what I have, in some ways. Although I got mine earlier than you it sounds," Scott replies.
*
"I understand it usually comes earlier," Ava nods. "But maybe everything else that I went through affected it. Or maybe it's…I don't know." She takes a turn, heading toward small neighborhood park. "What you did the other day. That was…big. How do you hold it back?"
*
"Glasses," Scott says. "For some reason they prevent the blasts from coming out. Wish I'd have had those when it first happened."
*
"So that's why you wear them." Ava tilts her head, giving him a speculative look. "I can only imagine what it must have been like. Not even being able to see. I'm honestly still not…entirely certain if mine are a mutation. Something in my mother's notes makes me think it is. But they also didn't happen until after I was exposed to a very large shock. So. But when I came to, it was just…there. Coiled inside of me. It's not bad most of the time. But when I'm angry, or nervous, or stressed? Then I have to try very hard to keep it back."
*
"It's good you've learned to control it at all. There are a ton of mutants out there, not saying you're a mutant, but for all intents and purposes it doesn't really matter…But there are a lot of them out there who really struggle with that. Some with really dangerous powers."
*
"Like eyes that make walls of light," Ava teases gently, smile flickering. "It's not a thing you really control, is it? You have the glasses. But no matter how hard you tried, you wouldn't be able to make it stop."
*
"Nope. The only way I can stop it without the glasses is to just close my eyes. I'm lucky though, there are some people who have no way of keeping theirs in check. Those are the people who really struggle."
*
Ava nods, hands in her pockets as she hops up onto the merry-go-round - that metal contraption that sends kids flying once it spins fast enough. She dips one foot, giving it a kick to start it slowly circling. "And I've heard there are still people here, in America, who would take advantage of that."
*
"Probably are," Scott says with a raised eyebrow. He's heard talk about it amongst the X-men, but he doesn't get told much. Still at the kiddie table, as it were.
*
"Not just probably," Ava shakes her head. "Places like where I was in Russia. Places that only want people to be weapons. You should be careful, Scott," she cautions. "Not that you can't protect yourself, but. I would be very unhappy if someone did that to you."
*
"I think this is the part of the conversation where it comes full cirlce and when I let you know that I can take care of myself, too," Scott says with a chuckle, hands in his pockets as he looks up at her on the merry-go-round.
*
"Yes, well. Turnabout is fair play, isn't it?" Ava grins as she circles back around. "Besides. You seem…normal," she admits. "Most of the people I know can hardly pretend to be normal. So it would offend me on a deeper level for someone to take that away."
*
"No one is normal, Ava," Scott says with a chuckle. "Anyone who pretends to be normal is probably just a faker."
*
"Well, then some people fake it better than others." Ava would know. She drops her foot again, giving the wheel a slightly harder kick to spin it faster. "You said you fixed up a car?" she asks as she circles around. "That sounds like a useful hobby."
*
"It's kind of a hobby for me. I take older cars, fix them up, then sell them. It's only my second one, so it's not like I have a ton of experience doing it, but it is something to obsess over."
*
"Because you obsess," Ava grins, amused. "It's a useful skill, either way. If everything else went horribly wrong in your life, you could always get a job fixing cars."
*
"Yep," Scott says with a nod. "I might try and get into politics, or teaching, but I can always fall back on that. And even if I don't, I can always do it on the side for extra money." Scott shrugs his shoulders." Scott shrugs his shoulders as if to say it's no big thing, but it's something he really loves to do."
*
"It's a good sort of hobby for someone who sees the possibility in things," Ava muses, settling cross-legged onto the edge of the merry-go-round, watching the world spin around her. "See what the car can be, make it all right. Much simpler to fix than most of the rest of the world, too. I can see why it would be satisfying."
*
"It gives you a sense of control over things. That's more than a lot of people ever really feel," Scott admits. He looks up into the sky, wondering if Ava is getting dizzy, and picturing what she must be looking at, albeit through rose tinted glasses.
*
Ava lets the spin slow, bracing one elbow on the hold bar as she comes around to Scott again. Sure, she's a little bit dizzy. But not too bad. "I can understand that," she agrees. "When you spend your life as someone's pawn, or when there are such big things you can't control, then you control everything else you can. Like choosing not to find a regular job, or take charity," she winks.
*
"And you get frustrated by the things that are too big for you to control," Scott says as he reaches out his foot to knock against hers, bringing her to a stop. "And so you fight."
*
"And so you fight," Ava agrees with a nod, smile quirking. "Speaking of which, if you ever get yourself hurt, you should try the free clinic out in Harlem. I have a feeling someone there has a few…gifts."
*
Scott nods, "That's a good tip. I haven't needed to thus far." His voice trails. "But the day ain't over yet."
*
Ava laughs, holding a hand up to him. "Try not to get hurt, first. But yes, if you do." She actually seems relaxed, which is more than can usually be said for her. "Thank you. For actually stopping in."
*
"Thought it was you," Scott says, taking Ava by the hand. If she lets him, he'll try and bring her to her feet. "Figured I'd say hello."
*
Ava takes the support. She could pick herself up. She could flip herself off the playground equipment if she wanted to. But she takes the support, smile crooked. "Well, I'm glad you did. But I should let you get back to your friends."
*
"Yeah," Scott says with a chuckle and a nod. "I got a long drive ahead of me and I have class in the morning." By class he means high school. He's only a senior.
*
Ava should by all rights be in high school. If that. By her own admission, she's been on her own since fourteen. Instead, she has a job at a spy agency, where she wants to check on the progress of the interrogation of the assassin. "Well, look for me the next time you're in the city. If you want to. I'm usually free," she grins.
*
"I will," Scott says with a nod. "You can definitely count on it."