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Green-Wood cemetery
Time: Morning
Status: It's too early for this. Where is the damn coffee?
Wheather it was word of disturbance, or a call placed into the Sanctum Sanctorum at 4:38am, or a shortcut to get a bagel a few people find themselves at what should be a park for rest. It was here, just before 8am, that there seemed to be 6 cars all with a slashed back tire and much trampled grass. This was really not call worthy, but it was apparently John Constantine worthy who had the last of a steaming up of coffee, and one side of his face bruised from a fight maybe a few hours old. Classy.
Don't ask where coffee is. Wanda has no need for coffee to announce the daytime hour. The last four hours kept her to a different schedule than the average New Yorker, but she does not think of herself as average or New Yorker, so it fits. At least the twins enjoyed the chance to chow down on copious amounts of spaghetti at the start of that particular witching hour, and the witch hums along to a carb overdose. Perhaps less oregano and tomato, that edge already burned off. Her steps tread the pavement lightly, anticipating trouble. Nothing good happens after dawn. The swish of her coat licks around her calves, halted regularly enough for her to take a constant measure of her surroundings. Where death goes, she's frequently disturbed, the burning sensitivity of her almost perpetual arcane sight tripped by the least trigger. This is why she relies on Pietro, to keep her from running into walls, cars, snails, or bums. No, really.
"Looks like Krakow," she murmurs in flat Transian to him; it's familiar, and thus available.
Pietro Maximoff follows along with his sister, her sensitivities drawing them along. He isn't sure precisely what she senses or what drew her here, but he doesn't need to ask either. If she thinks it's important, then it's important.
He's clad in a cream-colored turtleneck and slacks, only his running shoes a variation from the relative formality of his clothes. A supple suede jacket hangs loosely on his shoulders, a shearling collar framing his throat.
"It at least smells better," he says, flexing his hands. "Care to give me a clue as to our purpose here, my own sweet sister?"
Constantine was wearing yesterday's suit and wrinkled accordingly, a slightly exhausted tan trench coat, and smelled of 2 day stale cigarette smoke that clung to him. He was sitting on the bonnet of a yellow Studebaker getting his attention drawn to the fraternal twins; specifically the familiar face which quirked a faint smirk of amusement. "Missed me, did ya, luv?" He lifted the near expired cup of coffee towards the woman that helped him put Baba Yaga's house back in it's own space. "How's life treating ya, toots? Ya missed all the fun. Should have seen it 3 hours ago." He looked to Pietro and gave him a nod. Blunt this one.
Dark roses saturate the immediate presence around Wanda, a whisper of resinous woods growing stronger when she rolls a tiny, perforated sphere around her fingers. Not simply to smell good, the olfactory response drowns out the conflicting impressions, slicing through the grease fat of daily life to acknowledge the oddness beneath. "«Something snarled the lines of fate. They went loose and left a hole.»" The rattle of discomfort in her shoulders tugs and twinges, settling into the pit of her stomach. "«Someone said trouble came here. The house was insistent.»" Or, you know, a nice telephone call could be insistent, but better to increase Pietro's distrust of her home as being semi-sentient, which it most certainly is. That might allow the best practical jokes on the master.
Her shoulders lift slightly as she slips into occlusion behind her taller, broader twin. The sun behind the moon leaves a luminous outline anyways, sleeve and flared line of her leather coat. In English, she's about a hundred times more terse. "What did it?"
Pietro Maximoff frowns at Constantine, his brow furrowing and nose wrinkling in sure signs of distaste. Pietro may not be a touchy-feely sort, but that hardly means he prevaricates about his emotions. He wears them quite openly on his sleeve, especially when they're unpleasant.
"I presume you know this vagrant, Wanda, given his familiar tongue and odious air," he says. "I'll let you speak on arcane matters, while I keep myself helpfully downwind in case of need."
Constantine seemed to have no ability to take offense. Hell it amused him. Maybe it was just that he was in truth 60 years old and hadn't slept in 40 hours and was in a fight worthy of a nonsensical 16 year old. He sipped his coffee. His head tilted, "The vehicles? Well that'd be me." Why he sliced the back tires of six cars? well he didn't say. He pointed that-a-way cup still in hand. He looked to them, "You familiar with Mutants?" Nope, no idea whom he was talking to. Clearly. That or he was the most clever cover in oblique way.
This is why soap flakes feature heavily in the go-bag and the other gear Wanda often carries around somewhere. Elsewhere, captured by the flick of a wrist and the proper incantation, anyways. The heavy scent of smoke and the coal stain aura intrude as they will, forcing her to narrow the bands which she perceives a little to avoid being overtaken. Her own aura is a flashpoint of the heavenly spheres, celestial tones chiming in murmuring alignment behind her. One star insists on being especially noisy. "We stopped Russian monsters." That makes for a quick, easy description out of her, the kind she prefers. Soft-spoken, her faulted accent crackles and falls down rough slopes. Her fingers slide around that round sphere, taking a hint of comfort out of the familiar and ancient rhythms.
"The rest."
Pietro Maximoff raises an eyebrow, "Russian monsters, eh? Some of the worst kind," he says. He flicks a bit of lint from his cuffs and shakes his head at the mention of mutants, "Mutants? Is that one of those rock and roll outfits from England?" he says, flicking his eyes over towards his sister for a moment.
"Ah, no, I recall now. The superhuman sort of mutants, with the amazing powers, often murdered and ostracized for the simple act of being born, inevitably to rise up and throw off the shackles of bondage to avenge and defend their murdered brethren. Those mutants. Yes, I believe I may have a casual familiarity with the subject," he says.
Constantine actually cracked a wry grin Pietro's way, but nodded to Wanda, "Nah but they should be, Mate. Well, I'd say you'not minced words on the situation." He didn't seem to have opinion one way or the other. Pointed middle of the clearing. "Cultists took some lad out of Mutant Town last night. Brought em up here to feed him to a starving god." He squint a look to the pair with a shake of his head. He looked to Wanda and arched an eyebrow, "Wanda? John." He looked to Pietro and either he'd give a name or he wouldn't. Eyes went back to the mix in the red coat.
See, that's why Pietro gets to answer the important questions and Wanda stands at his shoulder as a muted underline and italic to his bold statements. Her arm moves slightly, fingers freed from the slanting pocket. A light touch down the back of Pietro's arm is one of those very rare moments when she reaffirms the contact with an extension of herself, all said and done. Her thinned eyes are a clear amber, and no, no one is mistaking anything by seeing a flowering plum susurrus blurring the boundary between pupil and iris. Not at all. "God. Which god? Thing hungry for worship or hungry to be divine?"
"Quicksilver," he answers, simply enough. He's taken it recently as a badge of honor - all revolutions need their heroes, after all, and Pietro Maximoff doesn't roll so easily off the tongue. And he likes the sound of it.
"Aren't all gods both? I've yet to meet a one worth the blood they wring from their followers," he says. "I have many issues with the Soviets and their regime, but their distaste for churches is well-deserved. Whether god or man is responsible, if a mutant's been harmed, there shall be hell to pay. And I'm more than content to collect the debt."
Constantine gestured to the tall fellow commenting to Wanda, "He's sharp this one. Keep him around." He finished his coffee and set the cup on the bonnet of the car. His cheeks sucked in and he thought about it handing Wanda he Quicksilver as he chose, what he had. "Yeah. Ungrateful bunch the lot of the bloody bastards. Still, more the former than the latter. Lord of Masques. He surfaces to feed every hundred years it seems and his followers are stupid enough to believe any god shares power. They give the illusion, sure, but not really."
Wanda shrugs her shoulders on the questions of gods. Hers is a noncommittal stance, one of those drifting reactions that never really defines itself into full meaning or purpose. She knows what she knows. That much may be clear from her silence, Pietro's explanation given room to stand on its own. "Lord of Masques. Source? It has a place, legend." These are comments to make in neat stitches, stories to bind together fragments of mythos.
"Lord of Masques? Does he haunt costume balls, then?" Pietro says, tapping a foot a little faster than should normally be possible, a constant drumming along the pavement just to let out some of his excess energy. He's already getting bored, of course, as he is most anytime he's forced to engage with others for longer than a moment.
"Demon trickster manipulates rubes, truly a scintillating tale of woe. Where is the mutant in question now and how many idiots in silly robes must I pummel to return them to their proper home?"
Constantine actually cracked a faint grin. Direct. Knuckle cracker. He might actually not dislike the guy. He leaned forward , elbows on knees and looked around at the grounds and finally hopped off the car. A squint was given at the grounds and he shook his head, "Most ran. I have one…detained that I'm bringing to an old friend to…question." He paused and looked to Pietro arching an eyebrow, "I'm happy to let you talk to him after. You seem to have a stake in this, mate. We've no quarrel with that. The lad was brought back to his aunt in Mutant Town where he lives which I don't feel a need to disclose. They're having a hard enough time with this but… he's fine. But… eh all in all the kid's alright. This Lord of Masques was last heard of in London among the Picadilly crowd but I haven't much more on it at this time. Thought I'd see if they left anything of interest buuuuut… they have not. Silver mask though, if you find one, luv? Best not to put it on but you knew that."
"Silver mask. He wears these, or the cultists?" Wanda has to thumb through the lexicon of wisdom and knowledge accrued for a very, very long time. She's a European witch, not London but good enough. Agatha Harkness is an ancient terror, to be sure. The Atlantean witch trained this witch, so all is good. How much does she know of this particular godling? There are assumptions to make. "The mutant, give to Quicksilver. He knows about it. More than weakness in body."
Constantine retorted "The people without common sense wear the mask I think o capture ouls into them. To commune with their deity du jour." Walk around it was. Brown eyes offered the faint semblance of an apology, "Would if I could, luv, but the Mutant is with his family as of half five this morning. Though iiiif you fancied to have a cuppa with me over breakfast I might be inclined to let you have a poke at the lad he had in the boot." Was he- yes he asked her out? Really? Really JOhn? This man had really no clue who she was but appreciated the hell out of quality company.