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Who had the bright idea to come to Coney Island on a rainy March morning? That would be Wanda, for whom the grey gloom holds no real trouble, given her brother can run between the raindrops. She carries a black umbrella over her shoulder, and the nearly vacant boardwalk brings a certain melancholy charm. Few of the shops are open, the arcades shut down, and the cafes posting limited hours at best. Still, one hopeful vendor hawks bags of chips and stale coffee that's burning hot, with little flavour to speak of. Hot dogs are out of the question. She makes do snacking upon shards of honeycomb, the real thing sweet as crystalline dust, and stares out at the miserable sea.
"These people live far too indolently," she says in Transian, tapping her fingers against the metal rail. "We never had such luxuries, even in Berlin. I watch them turn a blind eye to all the threats around them, and I worry what slips past so many soft people. It makes our work so much harder." A hopeful seagull cries at them, ignored for its mews. "The witch behind you becoming undead is alive. I thought it too hopeful that we sent her to her grave. Be careful about Central Park. I will craft you something to keep you protected."
*
Pietro's attention-span is not… ideal. Rather, he finds it difficult to staaannnnnd… and waaaaaiiiiit… and lis — argh!damnit! etc… so he zips away in between sentences as his sister speaks, often returning with snacks.
And at the same time, he hears everything she says to him. "I do not need protection," says he in Transian when he returns with a hot drink from somewhere. He sips it, grimaces, and throws it in a nearby trashcan.
"What is there from which to be pro — wait, what is 'indolently'? Even in Transian it makes my jaw hurt."
*
Stand and wait is not the nature of the beast with these two, and she walks whilst talking. Wanda isn't so overly troubled by her brother's habits, reappearing with food as a mirror of earlier days.
"You have no defense against the kind of magic she uses. Yes, the undead you know how to fight, Pietro, but you are not a sorcerer." Her eyes leave the water, bestirred to a brilliant amber-gold shade, drops of honey. "They live very easily here. So much food and comfort, and the people do not know much hardship. A late train. Now they have to walk around Central Park. If this is too slow for you, pick me up and carry me around again." It wouldn't be the first time, surely, nor the last, that Wanda piggybacks him and they go flying through three sovereign states.
"I warn you because Morgan is angry, and will want revenge. She is cunning. A wolf's cunning, at that," she adds. "We can protect ourselves, yes, but she will be angry with us for killing her. So there is warning. Go make her life hell so we can laugh about it. Unless you have better things to do."
*
Pietro finally stops ducking off and turns to face his sister, while walking backwards in front of her. "No, I am not a sorcerer," he sort of agrees. "I am not your Boyfriend — ," and he glances aside with a frown on his face. "Now that I say this out loud I hear the wrongness in my choice of words. Okay."
He points a finger at Wanda.
"I'll leave the sorcery…" the man wiggles his fingers at his sister. "Humbo-Gumbo, as these Americans say, to Mr. Fancy-pants — but what can this Morgan do to me? I survived Busty LaRoux alright, no?"
Another pause.
"You are right about the Americans though — fat and slow. Walking around the park is what they call 'headlinings', yes?" It would appear that the silver-haired Maximoff is a little disdainful — or a lot.
*
"She can destroy you. She can give you poisoned power. She can transform you into a vessel of dark power and you would not even know it. Do you understand our lineage?" Might as well ask a tree if it knows what the sun is. Wanda's expression is grave. "She knows terrible gifts and had a millennium to refine them. You know what I can do after twenty years. Imagine a thousand. This is the scope of her power, without any guard on caring. Our grandfather can only protect us so much against her, his old enemy." Oh, if Pietro hasn't made that connection, she's talking about Merlin. She has in the past, in a similar tone.
Unable to help herself, she hooks her arm around Pietro's and ruffles his hair, leaving the two longer lines swaying in defiance of gravity as they always are. "The boys are already occupying too much of Stephen's attention, which is well and fine. I worry about you, the moon to my sun. What are we without one another? I also will not have you rotting away in a very fancy house for lack of attention." A good poke in the chest follows. "I have foreseen you standing on the moon. I do not know why, Pietro, but you will stand there and breathe as easily there as you do here. There is something you must do on the moon. It will be important. And the time is coming."
Of course, as far as anyone knows, the moon is barren.
*
Pietro blinks.
"Destroyed? Poisoned power? Transform me? …" He goes quiet for a bit, sparing a good-natured glare at his sister for poking him in the chest (he saw it coming, of course, but a poke is better than being turned into a jelly), and thinks to himself for a bit.
Finally he looks up.
"Are you saying this Morgan could turn me into… Busty LaRoux? and I wouldn't even notice it?" Apparently that is what he thinks of when confronted with words like 'destroyed', 'poisoned power' and 'transformation': a big-breasted vampire barmaid.
"Hold on," he then adds. "Go back. You mentioned the moon. You want me to do 'something'… on the moon. The moon… Can you please me more specific, Sis? Or am I to be guessing? If you tell me there will be invisible sharks (and vampire maids) on the moon I shall lock you in an ironing cupboard."
And he smirks. Impishly.
*
"She is Morgan La Fey of old English legend, and she is that. Her power is great, especially in illusions and changing things. I cannot guarantee what she makes you would be temporary," says the Witch, squeezing her arm around his. "But between me and Billy? We can bring you back. It may be a contest of battles, but you are blood of my blood, and he is blood of my blood. Her claim on you is weaker." That's the theory anyways.
Wanda is not going to be answering Pietro directly on whether or not he'll turned into a busty barmaid employed in Little Odessa, slurping on Ukrainian businessmen for his (her) life.
Let's admit it, he'd probably have fun for a little while.
"You will not have invisible sharks, Pietro. The moon. The real moon is up there, and you are going to stand on it looking at Earth. I saw it from over your shoulder. I do not know why you are there, dreams are rarely so clear. But when I dream true, you see it comes to happen. You are there, on a pillar or something. Maybe you finally annoy someone enough they throw you there, and I have to come and get you."
He smirks and she smiles back. "I will lock you under the stairs in the sanctum, and then we will be a happy family, big brother. No, there are not… such things there. I don't think there would be. Though I do have to recover a piece of magic from Polynesia. Do you feel safe running on water?"
*
Pietro holds up both his hands and takes a step backward.
"Never thought I'd be saying this, but — stop. You're going too fast for me, Sis." The speedster lets out a breath and leans forward, putting his hands on his knees. "There. I said it. …Whew. Swell. That was weird. Slightly freaked out now," he adds, holding up a forefinger and thumb held very close together.
"Firstly — there is no water on the moon. …Is there? There isn't, right? So why ask? (Oh, and I feel safe running on anything — I am Pietro Maximoff after all). Secondly, you want me to… stand on the moon, and… look at Earth? This is not sounding terribly difficult… but how would I breathe? Is it cold there? Maybe I should pack a coat…"
He frowns once more, genuinely intrigued and worried by what his sister has told him — despite his nonchalant behaviour. "I am… trying to do something important with myself here too, Wanda," he informs her. Maybe… you got the vision backwards? And I am standing here, on a pillar looking at the moon instead?"
"
*
Outfoxing Pietro is like a cherry on the sundae. She will remember this, bookmark it, and revisit it frequently.
"I dreamt you were on the moon. This is one thing." She holds up her finger and then rubs Pietro's back gently, an affirmation of understanding for his state rather than panicking him. "The dream happens, only that much I know. Why you are on the moon, the dream did not show. You were there. It tells me you have a reason to be there, something important to do, maybe. You were breathing. You were not in a space suit, either. I would say it is symbolism, but… There were all kinds of dips and holes, and ruined buildings where you stood, Pietro. You will go into space, or you will find the moon's platonic self in another dimension? Maybe you finally annoy the Doctor enough he hurls you there and learns you can move so much faster."
It's a sop to his ego and also mischief.
"The second thing is Polynesia. I need to run over the water to catch a boat, I think, piloted by the great spirits of the people there. For they hold the knowledge of the magic we want, and the heroes of Polynesia respect travelers. We are travelers, the Roma, at least a bit. And you are the fastest man alive, unless Tommy speaks true and he is bested by his girl, and she is faster than you. But I am doubtful." Pietro is going to cry, the day they all have a foot race. And possibly a coconut.
"You are important here, Pietro, and know you I will never stop you from being who you must be. We have to progress beyond what we were made to be. Always that. Maybe the moon has something to do with it. But no, you were very much looking at Earth. Whether you were happy or not, I cannot tell you, but you were… waiting. Hopeful, I think. Watching."
*
That is a lot for the elder Maximoff twin to digest, and he finds himself standing there, staring, sorting through it all. Of course, for someone who thinks at superspeed, it does not take long by other standards for him to form a response.
"You dream too much, Sister," says he, giving Wanda a playful nudge with a knuckle. "Where shall Igo first? The moon is not exactly on the way to Polynesia…"
*
She is used to it; he is not. Then being the weird one, rather than the fast one, has an advantage. Umbrella supported by the crook of her arm, she reaches out to put her hands on his shoulders. "Pietro. You need a pancake first. Then I think you will decide where it must be, except you know we are always with you." We. Family. More than her. It might be a weird situation.
Absorb what he will, she chuckles softly. "Tell me of your grand ambitions, what you do now to be faster. And maybe you decide for yourself if you prefer the moon or the warm islands of the Pacific. No sharks."
*
"To be faster?" he responds — and suddenly, in a streak of silver and blue he disappears…
Returning a few moments later in a different outfit and a hot cup of coffee. And a slice of pizza. "I run!" Pietro says it as if the answer were obvious. "What else is there?"
*
A different outfit and a piece of pizza. Is it meat? For meat toppings are a no go with the Witch, a curse of her requirements as a caster and her own ties to the divine and the damned. "You might be capable of accelerating objects to explode. I do not know, brother, my own abilities are not the norm. You do not fly, you move very fast. I wonder if you could run through things if you went fast enough. Push them aside. It is not quite teleporting as I do it." Her lips thin slightly.
And then she steals the coffee for a sip, though he's so fast, there might be cocoa there. But one has to try, all the same. "What else is there, but the greatest seafarers of the old world? I am happy you are near. You are well. I miss you, you big lout."
*
"I think some of those things I remember doing… before the vampire bit me — Drusilla. What is it with me and vampires? I must be candy to them… is not to me a pleasing thought."
Pietro grumbles for a bit, and shrugs his shoulders. "I would do anything to get my old speed back, Sister. Anything." He doesn't stop her from stealing a sip of coffee — but the pizza is definitely a 'meat-lovers'. Extra pepperoni. He finishes that himself.
"Come," says he. "We should walk some more. Feels swell to walk sometimes — with you, my sister at least. I do not mind the 'slow'…"