|
Lorna sighed as she stepped outside of the cafe, bundled up in her coat, scarf, hat and mittens. It had been bitterly cold, and everything was frozen stiff. Ice clung to sidewalks and on the edges of cars. The chill of the air stole her breath momentarily as she stepped outside from the warmth of the cafe, her breath leaving smoke trails behind as she stepped into the otherwise steady steam of bodies on the sidewalk.
Green eyes swept over the mass of humanity as she paused at a street corner to wait for the light to turn before crossing. It was in the afternoon, but the sun was already starting to slink lower behind the horizon of towering buildings that was the city's skyline. The Spring Semester had just started up again, but she had felt the need to get off school grounds for a while. A sort of bundle of energy had her walking to the nearest cafe and enjoying the sun while it was out.
Even if it left her squinting against the glare on the snow and ice that still littered the streets.
*
There shouldn't be anything strange about the local cinema.
People come and go at any time of day, or night, to watch the latest film. There are signs out the front, billboards and the like — and ever-smiling attendants selling tickets while promoting the most popular flicks.
Even in the cold.
Still, at the cinema nearest to the street corner where Lorna stands, there is something strange. Instead of the large sign above the entrance displaying film titles and session times, it reads:
I love you Mary, but Steve makes me happy. John.
Underneath this, it says:
Meet me on the 8:30 train to Chicago. Love, You Know Who
There are people with ladders outside the cinema now, about to change the letters back to what they should be. Meanwhile, Pietro Maximoff suddenly appears on the opposite side of the street, munching on a hotdog, admiring his handiwork.
*
It won't be for /long/ that topmost line reads that. Steve soon enough gets rewritten, at a speed that most people will never follow. Most. Ninety-nine point nine. Because the letters sort of rearrange themselves, and they soon enough read:
//I love you Mary, but Sherlock makes me horny. Love, John. //
A few swiped letters makes Chicago defaced, and admittedly that K is tweaked between two letters and a bit of duct tape, but it hardly matters. It stands proud and loud over the rest of the cinema, leaving probably a few souls mildly confounded as to what they might be doing.
The figure responsible scrambles back up the front of the sign to hide beneath the marquee, where only the very best of hoodlums lie in wait. The other one has like three cheese and ham sandwiches wrapped in waxed paper to keep him from snarling with laughter.
She didn't /rob/ the box office, at least. The redhead throws herself over the ledge and rolls neatly, coming up from her position in a tucked ball. "Now let's see how many people notice. Last chance to make a bet. Next minute, you figure it'll be how many? Minute starts in two seconds." It's a bloody lifetime for the traceur, and she slides back into her coat. It's too bulky to give her the awesome acrobatics skill she normally has, when hanging by one arm from signs and the like.
*
And one of those sandwiches was pressed against his lips in order to keep that laughter from happening. Oh yes. This girl could keep up with him. She was mischief made flesh. Maybe it was something that she was borrowing from him. Maybe not. He's not about to complain either way.
He forces himself to settle, though. Eyes scanning over the street. There's a couple familiar figures noticed — one's easier to pick out than the other, but they're both familiar faces in a sea of strangers. "In a minute? Thirty seconds before someone realizes that something's up. A gasp, five more for the chain reaction to start… I'm thinking about forty." Tommy tells her.
"Starting with the guy with the awesome hair right across the street." Fingers point towards Pietro from their hiding spot, lips curved into a brief grin. Let's see if she notices the resemblence.
*
ROLL: Hope +rolls 1d20 for a result of: 10
*
The sharp breeze that followed Pietro's movements had Lorna blinking and shivering in her coat, before her gaze landed on him. She didn't even notice the antics happening above her on the movie theater's front. Instead she made her way over toward the sliver haired mutant, her arms tucked up close to her chest as she tried to keep warm. She really was a creature of summer.
"Uhm. Pietro, right?" She fidgeted on her toes, glancing around once and back. "You're Wanda's brother, right?" Her voice continued to be awkward and hesitant, unsure in the extreme. But at least this time she wasn't throwing him around by the bits of metal on his pants.
*
The elder Maximoff looks suddenly embarrassed — and it is not because someone has altered the lettering he had already changed upon the cinema signs. "Uh, that's right," says he to Lorna, while distractedly looking over at Tommy and… Ahhhh…THAT must be the girlfriend! Back to Lorna, he puts the rest of his snack in the nearest bin and wipes both hands upon the buttocks of his trousers.
"You're… Lorna. I remember. How's…" He elogates the 's' so it sounds like howzzz…, " — it going?"
"GET UP THERE AND FIX THAT IMMEDIATELY, SON!!" bellows the manager of the cinema, who now stands outside the building, pointing at a young, male employee standing by a ladder (actually, he is more cowering behind it… while trying not to laugh).
*
Three hungry bites into another of the sandwiches while Tommy does the math causes her to pause, mouth full. Little nibbles to the bun and the slice of cheese makes a compromise between just stuffing the whole thing in her face like a chipmunk; her silliness expended for the current moment. Mischief requires her to channel observation powers instead, peeking over the edge of the marquee while the milling crowds don't spend long in the crowd, headed inside or spreading out. Instead, she pulls a knit cap over her head in a failed attempt to be comfortable and winter stylish, hiding the wild flames of her hair for once. Sliding a look under her lashes, she points to the frost-tipped fellow out there. "'Him?"
She's ticking off the seconds on her fingers, just about, while the poetry in motion of a guffaw or a laugh. Pietro looking their way does not go past the hypervigilant redhead; she's the one who watches out for asteroids to tiny floating arrows, and anyone looking up there is going to draw her attention even if she's pretty well hidden. Right until Mr. Manager is a jerk. Then she dips down.
"Damn, he's got no chill," she hisses, and throws the wrapper to the ground. Time to dance. "Go get some letters. I need an R, at least, and… Yeah." Then she's running the length of the sign and hurls herself over the edge, kicking her feet to the side and pivoting off her hand. It's not that long of a drop, less when she runs straight down the facade of the building, and blitzes through the box office, rifling through a few drawers and coming up with a box. Well, that's just fabulous. Out to go, she'll use the ladder at speeds that make even Pietro squint, her body a ghostly blur.
Soon enough, the second line is gone, blown out of the way and replaced with:
The Sword 'n the Stones: Doctor Strangelove - XXX, 8:30
Given the most popular movies of the day… well.
*
Strange arrives from RP Nexus.
*
Strange has arrived.
*
"Not at all." Tommy agrees, before bobbing his head once in agreement. She goes along with his mischief, he goes along with hers. Especially since if she hadn't beaten him to the punch, he probably would've been right there in her place. "On it." he adds, and then he's gone. They might even bump into one another down in the box office — the poor cashier must think that there's a localized tornado going on in there with two speedsters working their craft in such close proximity.
So much fast though, and there's times when he has trouble keeping up with sight of her. Is she /faster?/
That's a frightening thought.
When the sign gets changed yet again? …he can't help but to laugh out loud. Grinning from ear to ear. Oh, he feels like he won the lottery with this one. Another zip to catch back up with her.
"C'mon, Spicecake. There's some people you should meet." Hands shuffle around so that sandwiches are in one hand rather than two, and the empty hand reaches out for one of Hope's. Assuming she lets him take it, he's going to lead her over to the other pair on the street. Superspeed, to appear behind Lorna and Pietro; the latter will probably see the movement. The former might have trouble, but could possibly feel the bits of metal /on/ them coming closer.
"So, interesting movies they're showing here these days, huh?" He can't stop grinning. Oh man. He's trying. It's not working very well.
*
Strange leaves, heading towards RP Nexus [O].
*
Strange has left.
*
Lorna bit her lower lip, chewing at the chapped skin there, and she exhaled, stamping her feet slightly to stay warm. Unlike all the speedsters around her, she certainly wasn't moving around a whole lot. "Er.. okay.. I guess.." She trailed off, her brows furrowing as she glanced back toward the marquee above at the manager's bellowing. Her expression pinched in confusion.
And then Tommy was suddenly there behind her and she jumped, in fact, almost everything metal in her immediate area jostled around with her startled state.
"Ack! Tommy? What are you.. wait.. were you? Wait, no, never mind I don't want to know."
*
The trash-can next to some pedestrians rattles as though shaken — the moment after one of them drops some rubbish next to it, rather than inside. The pedestrian — a young woman in her twenties — yelps in alarm, and immediately picks up the offending piece of trash (a can of soda) and puts it in the bin.
"Did you see that??" she asks her girlfriends in wonderment.
"Told you so," says a friend with a nonchalant shrug.
At the same time, a passing car rattles (also courtesy of Lorna's magnetic personality), causing the driver — a man in his fifties — to look back over his shoulder and snap at the children behind him: "I said stop that! Right, that's it. No film for you two!"
Amid a chorus of: "AWWWWW!!" from his kids, the disgruntled father drives away. Meanwhile, Pietro shuffles his foot uncomfortably. He still has nightmares about his stint as a vampire, and having bitten Lorna during that time… he feels very ashamed.
To Tommy he smiles, grateful for the distraction. "Hullo!" says he a bit more brightly. "Is appearing you had the same idea — Hu-llo…!" His eyes flash with mischief when he greets Hope, and he extends a hand toward her. "You must be Hope. Have heard much."
*
Distraction is Tommy's middle name, to say the least. It's one of his specialities. When paired up with Hope? Doubly so. It takes him a few moments in order to settle down from the internal laughter — and the feel of the metal bits in his pockets; keys, mostly. Not to mention his watch — shifting around from the shock. He doesn't know exactly where it comes from, and there's a tinge of curiousity… then he just shrugs.
…and grins again at Lorna's words. "Oh, are you /sure/ you don't want to know? It's such an interesting story." A pause, and he glances left, then right, "Maybe not around the little ears, though."
Whether or not there's a story is debatable. Even if there /isn't,/ Tommy could almost certainly whip one out of thin air if needbe. It was a talent.
Then a grin over to Pietro at the recognition — yup, definitely her. "Well, what can I say? When my girl has an idea… it's usually going to be a lot of fun and I'm probably gonna go along with it. She's good about returning the favor." …now to /properly/ make introductions. "Hope, meet my Uncle Pietro, and my, uh… Cousin, probably, Lorna. Lorna, Pietro, my girl Hope."
*
Lorna was awkward about Pietro, espeically given that he had bit her and that last time they had met? It had been in the park and ended with her father tugging her along and away. Tommy, by comparison was a welcome relief.
"Uhm, yeah pretty sure." She winced as she glanced up at the Marquee and back toward the speedsters around her.
"Uhh, maybe cousin. We don't know anything besides Wanda's spell thing. And I dunno how accurate that was? And also remember that little detail where most of my dad's family was kinda sorta killed by Nazis." She glanced toward Hope and beamed.
"I know Hope, we met before."
*
Pietro extends a hand toward Hope in greeting, smiling broadly. "Is a pleasure meeting you, H — ."
"GET THOSE SIGNS CHANGED, BOY!" the cinema manager bellows again, interrupting the silver-haired speedster. The poor kid on the rickety ladder is not having a good time of it, and the shouting from his boss is really not helping the situation. "WE GOT CUSTOMERS ALR — !"
There is a gust of air between the 'street-corner family reunion' and the cinema, and suddenly the portly manager finds himself standing in the middle of the street with his trousers around his ankles.
Pietro passes the man's belt from his right hand to his left so he can greet Hope again, smirking very smugly. The manager… runs indoors, hobbled by his own pants.
The other speedsters would have seen Pietro also rearrange the lettering above the movie theater again, to say: "ALL MOVIE TICKETS FREE!!"
Pietro looks back at Lorna and adds: "Is good seeing you too, Lorna. Uhm… I am sorry — about 'before'. I really am. I wanted to say last time, but… oh, hey — the sign's changed again."
*
"Right. Like I said… when it comes to magic and stuff, I don't /understand/ it, but it's what brought me back decades, so I don't really question it either." Pause. "If it /is/ true, though… that'd have to be some kind of killer story to explain how the escape happened from that crazy regime, you know?"
Seeing Pietro take off, though? Tommy watches for a few moments, then drives forward into his own run. Unlike the others, he's not going directly for the sign — he's going for the manager. The pants went down, and he aims for them. Shufle shuffle — wallet. Jackpot.
There's a moment to dig through. Pluck out a bill, zip over to the employee. "Hey, buddy. I think you dropped this." is offered, along with a ten dollar bill; then he's jogging — normal speed — back to the others. The rest of the cash is staying with him.
Sometimes you have to play Robin Hood.
*
What do you say to a man that's sorry he bit you when he was a vampire for a short while? Lorna certainly didn't have a clue. It had been a frightening, painful experiece. The fact that Pietro hadn't been in control of himself left her with no recourse for her fears, and certainly left her feeling awkward about the whole affair. Even more so after her father had lectured her about forgiveness..
So with such thoughts in mind she grimaced, glancing down to her cold toes. "It's okay." It wasn't, but that was what was expected of her, right?
Then her attention slipped toward Tommy and she finally realized, as the speedster handed off cash toward the poor employee, what had been going on behind her back more in full. Then she groaned, slapped a hand over her forehead and rolled her eyes. "Really?" She shook her head, and rubbed her hands together to try to warm them.
"You know what? Never mind, I really don't want to know. It was nice to see you all again, but I should head back to campus.."
*