A place to call home (Brotherhood)

[Tess Abrahams]

'A few minutes' was an understatement. A few moments conversation in the mansion could easily require an entire afternoon of meditation. Nodding gratefully, Tess took Spectre's offered hand, an action which she found distinctly quaint (who held hands with another girl over the age of twelve anyway?) but also reassuring. A sort of bridging seemed to be made by the connection, a gesture of goodwill.

The kitchen was awesome. Vaulted ceilings gave the entire room an open, airy feel that seemed appropriate for the richly stained mahogany baseboards. The wood was tempered by sleek tile countertops, the mottled grey-and-blue colour of Atlantic seas. In the middle of the expansive room was a large island, above which hung an assortment of pots and pans on a holder. Spotless steel appliances beamed from their respective nooks, and a welcoming breakfast table was tucked under yet another floor-to-ceiling window. Any chef would have been glad to set up house.

"I'll just have a water, with lemon if you have it." It was doubtful that they didn't. "Commercial juices are jokes nowadays and soda? Waaaay too much sugar and chemicals, not to mention the calcium loss that the carbonation causes. It's basically osteoporosis in a can." She was rambling, unwilling to permit any amount of silence which might allow her mind to catch up to the situation.

The girl took a seat at the bartop, neatly hooking her legs on the barstool's braces. Everyone had gathered in the kitchen now, and she almost chuckled; they were like a herd, moving in sync. "So how come you guys don't try and get the staff at Cullen's involved? I mean, surely there must be a middle ground where everyone can cooperate. They've got to have some interest in preventing injustice, even out of a sense of self-preservation."

[Lazarus]

The sound of a soda can tab popping broke her line of questioning for only a moment as the fridge door closed. Malachi Rayner, or as he went to calling himself now - Lazarus - took a sip from the can. It hadn't been long since the riot that had resulted in him getting hooked up with the Brotherhood, and he was still trying to adjust to his new life.

"Some people don't want to see just how cold reality can be." he said simply, not really wanting to jump into the middle of the conversation, but unable to silence himself on the matter, if anyone understood just how cruel humanity was, he did. "Misplaced optimism, I think." he took another sip.

[Spectre]

"C'est la vie, Laz.." Spectre moved past Lazarus as he spoke, squeezing his shoulder. She introduced the troubled young mutant to Tess.

"Tess, this is Lazarus. He has just recently joined the Brotherhood. Lazarus meet Miss Tess Abrahams, she is a student at the school we talked about. The School for the Gifted, and a more appropriate title I cannot imagine."

Spectre moved around the kitchen with the finese of one of the Food Networks finest. She got out a pair of glasses, one for herself and one for Tess. Scooping a portion of ice into each. She retrieved a bright yellow lemon from a hanging fruit basket above the central kitchen island, along with a knife and began cutting it into sections. She dropped a couple pieces into her own, but curled a single slice atop the glass belonging to Tess. She moved to the 'fridge and filled both glasses with freshly filtered water and returned to the counter sliding one over to Tess.

Spectre slid into a barstool and crossed her legs, taking a sip of her drink.

[Tess Abrahams]

"Thanks." Tess said to Spectre, taking a grateful gulp of the citrus-gilded water. It was a welcome refreshment, and her parched throat rejoiced. After quenching her thirst, the teenager surveyed the young man. She took another sip of water before offering a tentative smile.

"Hi Lazarus." Tossing hair over her shoulder, Tess offered her hand, pausing to glance at her wristwatch; she'd been there for a little under an hour and already the world had been blown apart.

"I dunno, it just seems pretty careless to not take precautions. I mean, surely they've got some sort of plan for if things go awry?"

Hopefully. Otherwise the entire student body was collectively doomed.

[Karl Valten]

Michael watched the pair leave without saying a word. The girl was just so…optimistic. For the moment at least, the revelations would start to where through the ignorance soon enough. Still…

He sighed and the stone and sword vanished into thin air in his silver-tipped fingers. Apparently he’d missed quite a lot during Saladin’s demonstration in New York, but perhaps with the riot and all, his absence might have been a good thing.

“I can understand the Lazarus boy.” Arsenal unconsciously cracked his knuckles, reveling in the miniscule pops of pain. “But what’s with the idealist? You know she won’t be staying.”

(crap, wrong account. sorry)

[Saladin]

"Perhaps, perhaps not."

Saladin leaned lopsidedly in the large armchair and turned the restraining collar over in his hand. Almost carelessly, he closed the open panel with his thumb, and the red power light blinked on.

"But I don't want her joining us just yet. I want her back in Ethan's school where she can be our eyes and ears. She may even be able to help us find another very talented young lady."

With an expert twist of the mechanism, the power light winked out again. And Saladin floated the collar back onto the work table.

[Michael Lawston]

“All this cloak and dagger crap.”
<o></o>
Arsenal sighed and shook his head. Planning, planning, planning. It seemed that it was all Saladin had done since the <st1:state w:st="on"><st1>Nevada</st1></st1:state> incident. Michael pushed himself off of the wall moved towards the exit.
<o></o>
“It’s so much easier just to act.”
<o></o>
He held a hand out towards Saladin. With just a slight, purposeful lapse of concentration, the silver spread from Arsenal’s fingers to cover his hands. Glowing sparks began to fly as the silver skin began to boil under the surface. In an instant a bright flare highlighted the room followed by a BANG. And as soon as it began, the chaos stabilized and the silver seeped back into Michael’s finger tips.
<o></o>
“…but what ever you say, Boss”
<o></o>
Arsenal turned and left the room.

[Lazarus]

He accepted her hand and shook it with a smile - everyone had been so nice to him, since coming to the Brotherhood. It was a very pleasant change from what he was used to.

"I dunno, it just seems pretty careless to not take precautions. I mean, surely they've got some sort of plan for if things go awry?"

"Maybe they do." he sipped his soda glancing away, as if deep in thought for a moment. "Maybe they just don't think the students should know about it." He shrugged, "Course, who am I to make a guess like that? I don't know much about the school, other than what I've been told of it by Spectre and the others here."

[Tess Abrahams]

Tess narrowed her eyes suspiciously. There was something in the way Lazarus supposed that made it sound as if there was more to what he was saying.

"What, like we're not mature enough to know about it?" She laughed lightly, and there was a shade of bitterness behind it. "I'm pretty sure that if we can handle being freaks, we could handle a contingency plan. There'd be no need for secrecy."

She crunched an icecube noisily between her molars. "So... that whole thing about building a mutant society. What," Tess paused briefly," What does that involve, exactly?"

[Saladin]

All eyes seemed to turn toward Tess for a moment. In fact, they were directed behind her. Saladin had risen from his seat and entered the kitchen with measured strides.

"You are looking at a small part of that here," he said. "The promotion of mutant unity. Mutual protection. But our vision is much larger than that.

"We aim to create a haven for all mutantkind, free from the oversight of small-minded, bigoted politicians. A place where mutants can develop and enjoy their gifts without fear of discrimination or reprisal. Think of the wonders you've seen at Cullen's school, for all its faults. Think of what could be accomplished by an entire community of mutants united and free."

[Tess Abrahams]

The girl was silent, palms twisting back and forth along the slippery surface of the sweating water glass. The tail end of Saladin's last statement echoed in her head; united and free. For all her voracious involvement in altruistic campaigns, Tess had always considered freedom to be a discriminative concept. All human beings were born free and equal in dignity and rights. Mutant abnormalities not included.

So while she'd thrown herself into demanding freedom for others, Tess knew that the same principles didn't apply to her type.

Then had come a year at Cullen's. Acceptance, instead of ostracisation. Now the very ideals that the group before her presented seemed possible.

One thing troubled her--Saladin spoke as if mutants were somehow superior to humans. That idea didn't set with her. Tess swirled the melting ice around, visibly torn. "What about normal people, er... non-mutants, who accept us? Surely we wouldn't exclude them; that'd be be just as bad as them doing it to us--worse, even."

[Spectre]

"Think on it like this, Tess." Spectre began..

"Those who do have the capacity to accept us, they are the minority. There will always be people who see this phase of evolution, not for what it is, but as sickness.. Something that is wrong with us." She frowned at the thought.

"This place that we seek.. it is for us to be free from the morbid curiosity of those kind. Where children with special abilities will not be poked and prodded at like rats in a lab. Any segregation will be for our own protection. Coexisting will cease to be possible as the anti-mutant movements continue their violent attacks."

There was a war coming, yes. Those present would not sit and be idle victims. They would fight back. Their cause was worthy. It was their lives and freedom they fought for. If the homosapiens were willing to break a few eggs to make an omelette, the Brotherhood was willing to open a 'round-the-clock breakfast buffet..

[Saladin]

"For ten thousand years, humans have been the dominant species on this planet," Saladin said. "Now, for the first time since they learned to throw a spear, they are meeting their match. Their instincts as a species are telling them to go on the offensive, to stamp out their competitors or risk becoming obsolete. Individuals may overcome that instinct. Individuals can show compassion, vision, tolerance. But nations? Institutions? Governments?"

He sighed with all the weariness of the mutant world. "When your mutation was discovered, Tess, how many of your friends turned agaisnt you? How many do you think would have remained with you if not for the influence of the herd?"

[Tess Abrahams]

There was no need for the girl to give a verbal answer, for it was written across her face--in the taut lines of a frown, the cleft of furrowed eyebrows, and in the wake of eyes that suddenly flicked away to hide expression. Tess was not so naive as to believe any of the girls on her old gymnastics team would have come around, if given time, and taken her for what she was; she'd cut ties before they'd cut her throat. It was a story like any other mutant's.

The old, familiar sting of stolen opportunity thrummed in her chest. Tess unconciously echoed Saladin's sigh, grinding a palm against her temple.

"Right." The teenager finally breathed as she set her glass on the countertop. "Um. Have you talked to any of the other students about this?"

[Saladin]

"Other than Washington Square Park? No."

Saladin stepped up to the counter and leaned back against it. "And I doubt very much Mr. Daniels would welcome our point of view on his campus. You've taken a risk coming here, Tess. I really appreciate that."

[Tess Abrahams]

The girl shrugged as if to indicate that there had been no other option. There was a lot more involved here than she'd thought at her initial meeting with Tron. A hundred and one things were bouncing around her noggin, pulling and prodding her in every which way. She needed to think, and Tess couldn't objectively do that here.

"Would it be all right if maybe I came back here sometime? Like, later this week?" If anyone back at the Institute asked about her early return, she'd just say her grandmother was feeling off-colour and they'd decided to postpone their weekend. Tess glanced between all the faces, doubling back between Spectre and Saladin.

[Spectre]

"Of course!" Spectre didn't even hesitate. It was not their goal to keep Tess here against her will. It was far more important that she return to the school, but with an open invitation to return at any time and a means of keeping in touch..

The side of the stainless steel fridge had a magnetic sticky pad and a pen. Spectre tore off a sheet and wrote down a ten digit cell phone number. It was her own.

"That's me.." She slid the piece of paper across the counter to Tess with a smile.

"You may contact me at any time, for any reason. Please, feel free to do so and you are most welcome to return here.."