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Billy has arrived.
*
Pietro has arrived.
*
Friday evening and Teddy had nothing planned. Though it's starting to get warmer so hanging out on the roof is always a fall back option. The view still hasn't gotten old. Teddy looks puzzled at the knock on the door but goes over to answer it. Since he's not expecting anyone, and given he doesn't really get cold, he's in his usual pair of shorts and nothing else when he opens it. "Hi. Can I help you with something?"
*
Something swift and unseen blows past, through the door and into the apartment. In about the space of a heartbeat it moves about the domicile, until finally coming to a halt upon one of the sofas or chairs in the living room.
With snacks.
Pietro Maximoff is lounging there, munching away. "Hurry up, Sis!" he calls with certain aloofness to Wanda. "Is this the place? I… hope so." Then he looks over at Teddy and smiles. "Hullo! …hmm. May we come in?"
*
If Billy had known Teddy would be walking around half naked all the time when he agreed to be Roommates, he would have given serious thought to turning down the offer.
Who is he kidding? He would have said 'yes' ten times faster.
Still, Billy is in the kitchen with a spanish cookbook and a bag of groceries and he's staring perplexedly at the instructions, trying to figure out how to cook him some paella and not being sure where to start. Billy can not cook. For his part, he DOES get cold, so he's in jeans and a long-sleeve baseball-style t-shirt, even as he concentrates and nibbles on his lower lip. "You know there's like a 50% chance that I'm going to poison yo-" Then there's a woosh and Billy blinks, looking around, "To oh." Pause, "Hi, Pietro. Uh, Teddy, that's my magic-uncle Pietro, he's sorta like Tommy, right? I mean… obviously." Pause. 'Sis'? "And magic-mom Wanda is either still downstairs walking up the stairs or right behind him…" He seems… a little embarassed, over something or other.
*
Imhotep's Second Principle of Duality: where one is always two.
It sounds better in hieratic Egyptian, naturally, but very few people nowadays possess the means to read hieroglyphs, let alone saying the transliteration "Wi-iw-Xnm-inn mAa-n-sp" in any way that doesn't sound as though one chokes on a bone and a mouthful of wine.
Standing upon the doorstep, Wanda scarce registers as the normal inhabitant of Greenwich Village. For good reason, she may be the second strangest in residence, eclipsed by the good Doctor. Young, that, her leather coat and black garments cut a severe balancing act compared to the bright moonbeam already settled inside the apartment. Her jostled wavy hair falls back around her shoulders by the time Teddy settles into answering, and her chin lifts, apology briefly glimpsed in those frosted sunset eyes. "Billy gave us an invitation," she explains in lieu of a greeting, the English she speaks fatally shot by her fluid accent, the lovechild of Slavic and Romantic influences. "Good evening. I am Wanda. That is Pietro." The spitting image of Tommy in a way, there should be no question whom Billy takes after. Mostly. "My brother has manners. It may be hard to believe." She holds out a bag with a bottle of some liquor in it.
*
Teddy looks around at the sudden breeze then focuses on Pietro when he ends up sitting down and talking. "Oh, umm, yeah. Sure." he answers then turns back to look at Wanda and take the bottle. "Thanks. Come in. Yeah, I kind of guessed that, Billy." He steps aside to give wanda room, a white t-shirt forming aroundh im as he does so. "I'm Teddy." Though they certainly know that. "Nice to meet you."
*
"'Magic-Uncle'," Pietro repeats with a snort, and glances over at Billy to give him a thumbs-up gesture. "I like this." Then, giving Teddy a nonchalant second look, he adds: "So this is Other-Boyfriend; already I like him more than the Doctor-Boyfriend." The silver-haired man points half a biscuit at Wanda.
"That's hers, by the way." Pietro finishes off the biscuit. "Sister, if I were to ask what language you were just speaking — would I understand the answer? My box of 'weird magic-words and phrases' is getting very full."
*
"Hey, my family is really complicated." replies Billy to Pietro with a bit of a grin, "I have two sets of parents, and in a certain way *both* are true though for slightly different reasons and temporal mechanics, so to keep them straight in my head I have dubbed them magic-mom and dad and muggle-mom and dad, andsince you're related to me on the magic side of the family tree, you're Magic-Uncle." His grin turns a bit on the sheepish side. Heading back over, he lets Teddy take the bottle and such, and goes to try to give Wanda a hug. He hasn't done that yet, so he's not entirely clear on the Wanda Protocols for this sort of thing, so its something of an experiment. "Welcome to our apartment, folks." Pause, he flushes a bit at 'Other-Boyfriend': to Pietro he remarks, "We… only recently started officially dating. Insofar as you can date when you have to pretend to be dude-bros in public." And already they live together.
*
Ignorance of shirts is bliss. Not that the young woman committed to wearing leather pants or leggings at every turn would ever commiserate about bare-chested men with Billy in front of his roommate. Her twin brother scarce counts; Pietro is the external sum of the hubris, mirth, and laughter absent from her.
Rolling her shoulder in a shrug at the speedster, she says, "Old Egyptian. I need to know it." Why she needs to know it may have something to do with why she owns a pair of cutlasses from another dimension. Her smile lifts for a moment as she nods to Teddy. "Thank you for your hospitality. I am glad to meet you. Seeing the two of you happy together makes me and your father happy." She will underline that point for no apparent reason, though making people squirm like fish on Maui's hook is not limited only to her biological double. Either of them.
*
Teddy is about to ask something but just stops himself. He's used to Billy saying weird things and there's not enough time in the day to ask about them all. And it's not like he uses 'muggle' regularly. Besides, the meaning is clear from context. Closing the door behind Wanda, he heads into the kitchen to put the wine down. "Does anyone want some of this now?" So totally ignoring the whole boyfriend talk.
*
As for that hug, it shall be returned in kind, though it takes Wanda a moment to realize that she is neither being patted down for weapons or phased out of a dimension. Honest to the gods that be, what kind of life did she have that it takes her a moment to wrap her arms around Billy? But at least when she does, it's genuinely affectionate, setting her chin on his shoulder for a moment. Momentuous occasion: Pietro can jawdrop now.
*
Pietro shrugs.
"Had a look around the house," says he as he munches on another biscuit. "Figured it out." In truth, that is something of a lie. He did have a look around — a nice, long look, according to his perspective — but the 'Other-Boyfriend' comment was something of an educated guess — one he is pleased to have gotten right.
"I need to try this on Doctor-Boyfriend… but." Pietro sighs to himself, disappointedly. "Stupid wards, always getting fondled…" Instead, he dashes up from the couch, gives Billy and Teddy a quick 'bro-hug' each, and sits back down — with a glass of wine.
"Thank you," he tells Teddy. "How are things going?"
*
Experiment successful! Billy doesn't take the initial hesitation personal like, he is a very huggy sort of guy when he's not repressing it, so he lets it linger for a minute before pulling away and giving Wanda a very warm and dimpled smile. He nods over to Teddy then, "Yes, please. A glass would be good. I would offer for you all to stay for dinner, but I'm afraid I need to practice making toxic-waste paella three or four times before its likely to be edible to anyone short of a dark god of destruction." He looks sheepish again, "I know how to cook like… cheeseburger macaroni and… grilled cheese sandwiches. That's basically it. But since I'm on my own…" Sort of. "…I figure I should learn because like eating out every night is awkward." He pauses, and gives a very firm nod over to Pietro after the fast-hug is returned, "I know, right? Those wards creep me out. I swear Stephen summoned the ghost of a nosy puppy and put it into each one or at least copied its attitude. They're so weird. And touchy-feely." He can be touchy feely with people, with wards? Clearly disturbs him. "No one's been kidnapped by extradimensional slugs in like, what is it now? Two weeks?" he asks of Teddy, for his part of how-has-it-been-going.
*
Wanda disengages from the hug and manages not to appear worse for wear. She brushes her finger down the line of her burgundy jacket, assuring it hangs comfortably off her shoulders. "He can cook with an open fire and a can." A subtle nod tips to Pietro, putting him wholly on the spot. The calm delivery leaves little hint of a jest, and at any rate, the dusky-skinned sorceress rarely cracks a smile at the best of times. Transian is a necessity for a moment, if only because her capacity in English simply isn't there. "«You antagonize the wards, moonbeam, and they respond to you in kind. You invite the reaction.» It is true, the wards have their way. Like a person, a young one. One day I will see them walking around as we do." She gives a slight shrug. "The sanctum is guarded, which is good. It makes my job easier." And thus, in a stroke, she identifies herself as Mistress of the Sanctum.
"Wine would be very nice. It is French." As if that makes a difference, she dips her head. "Good for sandwiches. Or whatever we eat."
*
Teddy is taken by surprise by the hug from a complete stranger so just kind of stand there during it. "Umm, what? Oh, yeah. No, no kidnapping. If we never see that asshole again, it'll be too soon. We can order pizza." he suggests as he opens the bottle and pours glasses for whomever wants some. " All the talk about magic is completely above his head so gets no comment."
*
"Is still practicing the hugging thing — good, no?" Pietro explains as he sips his recently-acquired wine with a grin. The fact that he appears to be helping himself to everything (and everyone — given the hugs) does not seem to register as a 'thing' to him. Water off a very fast, very full-of-himself duck's back, so to speak.
"Order to pick-up," he tells Teddy with a smirk, and then gives Billy a knowing look. "See, Sister — he gets it. The wards in your boyfriend's house are weird. Like puppies but with a… a… 'streak of Wanda' — wait, no. That won't work — those things molested me. Anyway, is a mean streak they have — and all I was doing was looking around."
He goes back to his wine.
"…and picking some souvenirs…" he murmurs under his breath with a mouth-shrug.
*
"Wait, you want to make the wards *more* people-like?" asks Billy with a somewhat alarmed expression on his face, "I admit of all the magic-things I've been learning about lately, wards are something I don't even kind of understand. I wouldn't know where to even *begin* with such an endeavor. I think if I tried I'd just make a person-person, which is a level of hubris that I do not aspire to, don't worry." He nods his head to Teddy's suggestion, "Pizza is good." He pauses, and eyes Pietro a moment, "… if his metabolism is anything like Tommy's, a couple." Pause, "Few." Billy doesn't quite have Tommy's bottomless pit of a stomach, but its close. Maybe all this reality warping makes one hungry.
He squints at Pietro then a moment, "Wait, a mean streak? They're weird and a little too touchy-feely and nosy, but I've never seen them be *mean* at all." His eyes narrow suspiciously, "What did you do, Magic-Uncle? Did you touch something? You touched something, didn't you?" Glancing over at Teddy, he explains, "Stephen's house is like this repository of magic doodads and he has these like spell things to keep people out and protect it and abrakadabra alikazaam crucio avada kedavra." His hands wave in a gesture mimicing mudras. Badly.
*
The mildest lift of sepia eyebrows conveys an obelisk worth of testimony without her saying a word. Wanda's silence speaks volumes that might end up refuting every aspect of supposed interest. It might be rude to sabotage the full-of-himself speedster in front of company, so she refrains, turning the conversation in another direction. "No," she replies, "I think the wards might become like a person in their own time. Have a body. They will be always magic. Sometimes magic can seem alive, and have some will or thought away from a spell." Please, someone teach her the word for sentience. She's at pains to keep Teddy in the conversation, though, and dips her chin in agreement. "Pizza is good. What is on it?" Or rather, the preferred kind. "My brother will eat one by himself and take more pieces. It is no different from Tommy. There have been no more problems with the slug?"
The flick of her fingertips cuts a banishing spell behind her back, even though she hasn't seen what on earth Billy might be trying to conjure. But it's something she is used to throwing banishments without looking. A lot.
*
And Billy explains. How nice of him. "So there are magical protections that molest you if you try to pass. Or worse, if you try to steal stuff." What else could 'picking souvenirs' mean. "Weird." Stepping over to the phone, Teddy dials the pizza place from memory and orders three pepperoni pies. No, four. He can eat over half of one himself. "Not so far. Maybe he got bored."
*
Pietro nods to Teddy with a plaintive expression on his face. "As it is for you, so it is for me — all this magic hoodoo goes over my head, and I have spent so much time around Sis, here… You would be thinking it'd rub off…"
The man grumps.
"It itches. Magic, that is. So, are you from New York, Teddy?" Pietro then frowns. "And from this time? Billy tries to explain it from time to time, and I am thinking I get it… but then I get a pain right here…" and he points with his wineglass to his right temple, spilling some of the wine.
Instantly the man is up, to the kitchen and back again, cleaning the spill before it hits him (or the sofa). "Not to worry!" he remarks, cheerily.
*
"Uhh. He kind of haunted our TV…" Billy points at said television in response to Wanda about the slug, "…in a sort of threatening way, but I think it was all bluster. I figured out how to change the channel on him so instead of broadcasting us, he was broadcasting like… classical music. Or christmas music. This really peeved him off. But since then nothing. I think we hurt his ratings." He has been eyeing his TV warily ever since, though. He unplugs it whenever its not in use. He blinks at Wanda a moment at talk of the spells, getting the word right away, "Wait, really? A spell can turn sentient on its own? Man, that has ethical considerations. If the spell is sentient, then does it have to fulfill its original purpose? Does it have a choice? Is it slavery if you force it to even if it decides it wants a new job flipping burgers? Or do you have some obligation to pay it somehow or reward its service because otherwise isn't that also slavery?" Pause. Billy blushes, "Err, I maybe am analyzing this too much. I blame the sci-fi books, I'm drawing a parallel between an artificial robotic intelligence and sentient spells and this topic comes up in the sci fi books a lot." Ahem. He is a nerd.
Billy heads over to sort of perch at the edge of the couch, sipping his wine a bit, "Yep." he nods to Teddy, "They keep bad things out — and in, too. There's a reason don't touch anything is a rule at Casa de Stephanos. Also I suspect they spy for him."
He grins at Pietro, "Hey, I am sorta a mage — though Stephen says I don't do magic — and I don't get it half the time." He watches his uncle with amusement: its sorta funny to see an old-Tommy up to his Tommy antics. Or, is Tommy a young Pietro up to his Pietro antics?
*
"They attacked the younger ones. Not us. Enough to see that you came out well. You do not need to worry but mind Lorna. She has been hurt worse by this adventure than we might be." The careful selection of a description slows Wanda's thoughts for a moment, but not longer than that. Her nod agrees with the pizza order, though concern clearly lies for human welfare as the topic of the moment. "She needs good people around her. Not all her friends are sable. And yes, a spell may be… like a person, but it is still a spell. It is always wise to have caution with magic. It is like any force, it is not always clear. I do not think you could make a slave of magic unless it had thoughts all of its own. Often it would not. It would be more like a ghost. It has a reason to act and purpose to be."
Philosophical questions aside, she gives a faint smile. Timelines can fork, and artificial intelligence… They truly have no idea. "Most magic protections will act in a way when they are turned on. It is unlikely they are turned on by everything. They would run out of power too fast, and it is expensive. The Doctor is right, too. What you do is not at all the same, but I see how you piece things together. Not as math exactly, but I do the equations you do to put things together."
*
"I just let him go on about it." And on and on. "And nod when he pauses." Teddy tells Pietro. "I don't need to understand it any more than I need to understand how those computer things work." Taking his wine, he goes to sit down on the couch next to where Billy is. "Taking stuff from a wizard is never good." WHich is the moral of this story.
*
Billy turns a bit when Teddy sits, so his knee sorta bumps against the blonde's, and he's so subtle about it, isn't he? No one noticed the moment Teddy got within touching distance Billy found an excuse to touch, however innocently. Right? Right. He nods slowly to Wanda, "I'll throw like a dinner party as soon as I figure out paella, and have Lorna come over and just be human. That or I'll open a wormhole to Spain and get takeout. I haven't found a *good* spanish restaurant around town yet, though I'm working through every single one I can find." He eyes Teddy a moment, "You know how condescending and dismissive that is, right? I have a sudden urge to kick you." He narrows his eyes, then snorts, and sips his wine. He nods then to Wanda, "Oh, I get its different. It works on very different rules. I just still think its magic. Hell…" He cocks his head at Teddy, "I have a hard time not considering his shapeshifting being magic. Anything that's not like mundane or fits into science seems like it fits the definition of magic to me."
*
"Nod when he pauses, huh?" Pietro says to Teddy with a smirk. "Okaaayyy, but usually in those moments I disappear across-country for coffee and pizzas. Oh! Speaking of pizzas!"
And like that, the silver-haired man is out the door, gone in the blink of an eye. He is not long in returning with pizzas — several of them — and… none of them appear to be quite the ones that were ordered. So where did he get them from?
He also brings drinks and 'sides' to go with the main meal.
*
Right. Nothing to see here, nothing at all. The owners of the apartment have executed something with such skill and grace, no one is the wiser. Wanda can unsee whatever she likes, and nothing in the course of a conversation strays towards the charming demonstration of affection. For all her frozen nature is not overtly demonstrative, she certainly isn't helpless about it.
"Paella. It is not made in a can, Pietro cannot do it." This fact is a close measure of agreement to coming over for dinner. Her expression cools slightly about the business of magic and Teddy's unease on it. Considering the reaction of the other spellcaster in the room, her reaction can be moderated. "Maybe you do not need to understand, but you like the benefits, yes? Travel very fast. Is it not a good idea to know what it is, so you understand him? Not the way of a scientist. The artist. Someone who appreciates all of a person. It is a large part of us. Not all. But…"
*
"I don't mean it that way." Teddy explains, reaching to squeeze BIlly's leg and glancing a moment at Wanda. "I don't understand magic or most of what you say about it. But I'm not going to ask you to stop talking about it. It's your thing. Besides, I might remember something you said that'll be useful at some point." And then there's pizza. "They can't have been done already. And I didn't order soda."
*
Billy eyes the … arriving collection of food, and he gives a long suffering sigh as he regards Wanda a moment, "If this was Tommy, I'd consider the chances of any bit of this was actually paid for to be suspect. Should I bet that Tommy inherited this trait from his Uncle or no?" he asks of her, then pauses, "I got a cookbook, and am trying. I just am crap at cooking. But man, the Planners took a trip to Spain a month ago and I had paella for the first time in my life— along with tapas, and various other spanish things— and I decided I wanted to convert. Starting today, I am no longer Jewish, I am Spanish." Pause, "But don't tell my muggle-parents." A quick grin. But he glances between the two, and the squeeze of his leg? Obviously appeases him completely. But he explains: "Heck, Teddy, *I* don't understand magic or most of waht I can do with it. I mostly run on instinct and imagination. I talk about it mostly to try to figure it out." He shrugs a little, "Because its actually really super dangerous. Like maybe *way* more then I've ever quite explained. But I also don't especially know what I can do: remember when I mentioned changing the channel on the slug? That was someone elses idea."
*
"We will pay," says the brunette, giving a tip of a nod to the stack of delivery boxes. They are sufficient for the task of transporting delicious baked bread products slathered in remarkably tasty tomato sauce, though she'll have to forego the pepperoni. Never fear, Wanda can put away as much as Pietro and more. She burns as fast and hot as he does. "Many Jews came from Spain. Not a happy history? I think they ended up made to go another way." History is a hard business for someone whose sense of time is not entirely on the same track as everyone else, in part because it goes in loops and twists and circles. "I think it may be smart for me to show you how to go into another place to change things and come out. They are not made to happen here. You do something there, it stays there or it does not stay at all."
*
Teddy nods to Billy. "I know that. You're still not good at closing holes." he reminds. "So I just listen and nod and let you talk it out." He shrugs a shoulder. "I don't mind. But I can't add anything either since it's not /my/ thing. Which is science, by the way. Genetics. Whatever my father's people can do can obviously be inherited."
*
"Hey, 'not a happy history' is like, the story of my people." Billy's voice gets a bit intense, "My dad's older brothers didn't make it out of Germany." He shrugs, not dismissing it, but. That's not the happy sort of topic. He nods to Wanda, "Is this the mirror dimension thing I've heard about? I thought of trying that but I can't to interdimensional wormholes. Possibly because I have no real understanding of what a dimension even *is*." But he does suddenly grin at Teddy, "Oh, I cracked the wormhole problem. If I always tie the wormhole to a *door*, then on the other side as soon as the door is closed, the wormhole is sealed. No matter who closes the door." Of course, this is all just a crutch: there's no specific reason Billy's magic needs to do door-portals or why he should have issues with closing, short of self-confidence. But he worked it out in his head that way, believes it works, so it does. He peers at Teddy, curious, "So you think your shapeshifting is… a genetic trait? Not some supernatural ability your people had or something? But hey, talking about science is good with me: the only reason I think I got any good at wormholes is because I know a lot about Einstein-Rosen bridges. I know the theory, apply it, voila. Wormhole-Doors. BUt genetics— are you going to be studying biology and medicine in college?"
*
A bit of a shrug answers Billy again. "I do not know that to be the history. I did not study the Inquisition so much as learn from a witness of it." Wanda slips away from the unhappy topic, on that note, and the mention of the dimension makes a problem easily solved. "One of them. There is another space that is not permanent. Nothing stays. I think that place is undone, or it is erased, and that will be the best I can make of how the rules there are." She curves her coat around herself, hands raised to the seams and plucking them forward, assuring she can be wrapped up in claret leather and suitably warm.
*
Wanda has left.
*
Teddy shrugs at the question. "Why would it be supernatural if they all can do it? And if I can do it even though never having been raised by one of them?" And then he makes a face. "Oh hell no. I'm not good at science. " Regardless of where the pizza came from, he goes to get some plates and napkins and then snags a few pieces.
*
Letting the twins eat and such, Billy slips from where he is perched to end up pushed right in next to Teddy, which may mean Teddy has to scoot a little to make room. But not too much room. Softly he says, "I don't see how either question has to do with anything: all vampires have teeth and vampirisms, and they don't have to be raised by other vampires to be vampirish. SUpernatural doesn't mean it needs to be trained. Stephen's type of magic needs training, yeah. Mine doesn't. I was born with it." A nod to Wanda over there talking to Pietro, "I get it from her, its in my blood. It's as innately part of who I am as breathing and walking is. I was doing it before I even had words to explain it." He grins, grabbing a slice for himself, taking small bites so he can talk and be polite at the same time, "But you just said your thing is science. Genetics." he asks, a bit confused.
*
Pietro has left.
*
Teddy's brow furrows before he realizes where the confusion is. "Oh, no. Shapeshifting is my thing. Which I was saying is science not magic. I didn't mean science is, just saying since earlier you said something about it might as well be magic."
*
"Oh, okay." Billy hesitates a moment, looking a little deflated for some reason, "Scientifically, I can't think of any possible way to explain what you do, which is why I don't really see it as any sort of thing that is purely based on science. Then again, … its not like my people are the masters of science in the universe." He shrugs and grins a bit sheepishly, "Do you know what your limits are? CAn you… shapeshift into a chair?" he asks, curious, "Or something with no basis in biological reality? Say, a dragon? You know it'd be really fun to ride a dragon sometime." A quick, wicked grin.
*
Teddy shrugs. "I don't know, Billy. It might be, it might not. How can I know? Are you wizards supposed to be able to tell if something is magical?" If Wanda doesn't like pepperoni, he'll be more than happy to take what she pulls off and put it on his own slices. "Yeah, I can do that. I wouldn't be wood but it would look like a chair. And I couldn't breath fire but it would look like a dragon."
*
"That's part of the debate." remarks Billy thoughtfully, "Magic is a word. But what does it mean? Stephen adamently insists what I do is not magic: I can concentrate and say some words and reality bends to shape itself according to my will. I don't know how to possibly reconcile those two points. Stephen, Head Wizard, says its not magic. Everything the word 'magic' says to me says that is almost the idiomatic definition of working magic. Who is right? What does it mean if we disagree? I don't think magic has an exact definition. Stephen, from his explanation, seems to draw power from external forces and shape it to alter reality. I draw power from my own will to do something that might look very different and have different rules but have some similar effects. He defines magic as what he does, and this definition just doesn't make any sense to me. I know I can see *magical energies* when people fling spells around: but if everything you do is internal to your body, I don't know that I could see any energies inside you. Because there's energy there, now, and all I see is your pecs and arms and perfect skin and eyes and lips and jaw and hair and and and." Pause. Glance sidelong to the elder Maximoff twins. Eats pizza a little faster. He murmurs, "Let's make smalltalk until we finish off the pizza. Then go upstairs under the stars and enjoy how its not so cold anymore. I'll spin up an occlusion. A light-bending. A privacy screen." His grin is quick, and he tries to hide it, but there's something wicked to it.
