driftfleet | [snuggle up real close everyone]

[She's still a little startled, just because she has been so tense about things. For a moment as she looks up, she's completely expressionless--and then she recognizes Kurt, and just lights up with a smile.]

Hey, Kurt.

[She tilts the frame so he can see the digital painting she's working on: a cityscape, with holes punched neatly through the buildings like cut outs rather than war damage. Right now she's just working on the sketch, with a little bit of color blocked here and there.]

I used to draw a little, in the army. To pass the time. Now it's... kind of the only thing I can do. Everyone at home said I should try to start my life over doing art.

Edited 2016-05-23 06:06 (UTC)

[He doesn't move until she smiles, nor does his expression change. After, that's when he walks closer, ostentatiously for a better view at the painting. (He would've anyway.)

Kurt's eyes widen slightly when he gets a good view; not at the subject matter, but at the program.] Gott, Piotr would have loved a painting program like that.

Your friends at home were sensible; this is good. Is that Proles?

Who's Piotr?

[She considers the picture.]

Kind of? Like this is the city, but the holes aren't really there. There was this thing a while ago that happened, where people could kind of... um. Walk in your dreams? Vision said mine looked something like this, so I thought I'd try to draw it.

[She flicks the image to the side to bring up the next, which is a page of little sketches, various crewmates: Vision, hovering near the vague outline of his fish tank; Kitty laughing; Misty and Castle with their maintenance bots; Kurt in a pose of boneless sleep. She grins at him.]

[There's a pause before he answers, the warmth and small joy in his expression faltering. He could have faked it, but he's coming to be fond of Wrath. He's beginning to trust her.] Kitty's ex-husband. He was an artist, one of the most gentle men I knew before the war broke him. He was.. a friend, before that.

Does that sort of thing happen often? [The idea clearly disconcerts him, though it shows less in his expression (mildly disturbed) and more in the tail that's sketching nervous symbols behind him. The things he dreams when alone are best forgotten, not shared.

It takes him a second to realize what she's doing, and so he only catches a glimpse of Vision's sketch. Seeing Kitty laughing brings a fond smile to his face, his two crewmates with the bots a chuckle. His own sketch Kurt shakes his head at, grinning.] Do I really look that young when I sleep? [Says the man who could still likely pass for twenty-something awake.]

He sounds really nice. [It makes her wonder why Kitty broke up with him, but relationships are complicated things.] Are you not friends any more?

[To the question, she shakes her head.] I don't think so? Just the once,, since I've been here. And it was a weird thing, like we all got temporarily put on the Marsiva.

You do look that young. [She smiles down at the sketch.] I like seeing people when they're asleep. It's like... A glimpse of what would be without all the weight of the world. Without all the bullshit. Is that weird?

[A shake of the head, and Kurt considers leaving it at that, but:] He.. died, in the last battle of the first war. A lot of our people died as well, because of him. [Most of them Piotr and Kitty's students, too young to be on the field now that Erik had that luxury. Piotr left them for dead, and they'd all paid for it when Paige came home.

He blinks, forcing his mind away from those memories.] Ah, good. I wouldn't want to burden you with my dreams.

[Adding a soft laugh to make it a joke, he turns the movement into a dip of the head, intending to brush a kiss across one of her temples.] I don't think so. People are interesting when their guards are down. [He pauses, then adds:] Though, I have seen what I would've been in another world.

[She considers this.] Died because of him... Did he fuck up, or did he become a not so nice person?

[Snort. Burdened.] I'm tough as hell, Kurt. [She needs a few more burdens.]

[Aww, and that kiss is nice. No one else is around right now, so it's okay to get a bit goopy too. She grins, reaching over to give his hand a little squeeze.] Really different? What was it like?

He fucked up. [He pauses, a couple of muscles around his mouth twitching.] I--it's more Kitty's story to tell, if she feels the need. He was still her husband at the time. ['--when he killed her in a rage.' Keeping his expression from turning cold with the rage that sits in his stomach is harder than he expected, even with trying to remember the days when Piotr was his friend.]

I know, that's what I like about you. Well, one thing I like.

[He squeezes her hand, something in the set of his shoulders relaxing at the easy affection. The effect is skewed when he snorts derisively.] The man was a god-damn priest. Well, he was dead when I went there, but before that he was a priest. [A while before that, and he's focusing on that to hide how unnerving it was to see his own autopsy photos.]

Okay. [She accepts this. She's not going to press. Though she does ask:] Is this something I should ask Kitty about, or would that just mean I was being nosy about something that isn't my business and it would just upset her for no good reason? [She'll trust Kurt's assessment of that one.]

[Aww, . he likes things about her. Multiple things. That gets a blush to go with the smile.]

What kind of priest? [Wow, that seems really... Different.] That sends really different. That's... Wow. How did you see that?

[He glances down, studying the sketch of himself as he considers. It really is very good.] Ask only if a man calling himself Piotr or Colossus shows up. Preferably as part of keeping her as far away from him as you can without getting yourself hurt. [Quickly, he adds:] Piotr was called Colossus because he could turn himself into seven and a half feet of organic metal. The only person on this ship I'd feel half comfortable meeting him head on is our captain.

[That blush is adorable. He wants to kiss it, but since they're in a dubiously public area he settles for brushing the spade of his tail against a cheek.]

Catholic. [He can't keep the sneer off his face or the derision from his voice, though both are fleeting. Kurt's hatred of religion has dulled since his younger years to a strong distaste.] There.. some of our worst criminals escaped from our world to theirs. I was sent to track them down and either execute them, or bring back the ones with useful skills. I'd have rather killed the lot, but. When I was in that world, I worked with a sub-group of their world's X-Men.

[Wrath nods. Hopefully she'll be able to remember this--no, better, she'll make a note of it in that diary of hers Charles has had her keeping. This seems like a thing it's important to remember.] Understood.

[That, too, gets a little grin. She's got a lot of fondness for his tail already. She's seen people in Proles with body mods and sculpts that include tails, so it didn't bother her to begin with, but it seems so much more natural to him, probably because he's had it all his life. Part of him that really reflects what he's feeling as opposed to a best guess by medtechs or a careful fashion statement. Unconsciously there. She tilts her face a little toward it as well.]

Catholic... [With the air of someone trying to remember what exactly that is. Her only real encounter with religion had been the sort of bleed off from General Ravani, who was some brand of asteroid belt Methodist. And as far as she could tell, religion just sort of involved really good greenbean casseroles.] What kind of casseroles do Catholics make?

[It makes sense in her head, Kurt, promise.]

Okay. I'm glad you were able to complete your mission successfully. It sounds... difficult.

[Wrath's genuine joy at his body is one of the reasons he keeps seeking her out. Even among other mutants, his hands with their too few fingers make his touch alien. Between those who were driven off by his differences and the ones who liked him just for those differences, she's a comfortable and reassuring neither. It makes him comfortable enough to, say, cup her cheek in the flat of his tail like it were the palm of his hand. That's the best description he can give as to how it feels to him.

And then she asks that.] I--was? [His voice wavers with repressed laughter as he blinks at Wrath. Then he looses the battle against laughter completely, his entire face brightening as he doubles over.] I have no--casseroles?! [Picturing Saint Wagner presiding over a bake sale in full ceremonial robe sets him off into a peal of what are entirely manly sounds of laughter and not hysterical giggling.]

[It's really nice. It makes her feel cared for, all warm and happy. She should probably be on guard about crossing the line into some kind of relationship thing where she's just going to hurt Kurt and make him feel bad, but it's hard to not drink it all in when she always feels so starved for affection. Hopefully it's okay. It's hard to tell, she's not too good at this stuff. But it's such a sweet gesture, so very him.

Okay but why is he laughing. It's a super cute laugh, but... Confused smile here.]

Um? What do Catholics do if they don't do casseroles?

[She wants to understand!]

[He's really not one to ask about boundaries; Kurt's are generally based mostly on those of the people around him. A few things are off-limits, like the patch of red fur on his face, but otherwise he's more than happy to soak up whatever physical affection he's offered. It's just that, between growing up locked away and then spending the rest of his life in a war, he never really learned how to ask for it.]

Worship an omnipotent hypocrite. [His laughter subsides, in part because he's realized she's honestly confused.] They.. most of my experiences with them have been brief and hostile. [That's one way of putting 'they tried to sacrifice me as a child.'] They're a sect of a larger Abrahamic religion that worships an omnipotent god and the son he fathered, who was really a part of his soul. I think. The evil figure was supposed to look like an angel, but as the religion grew to absorb aspects from pagan religions, that changed. Their evil figure became something that looked like me, but red and with horns. That's why sometimes I call myself Satan in blue fur.

[Wrath leans against Kurt a little as he talks, just listening and trying to make sense of the ideas. God isn't anything that's really ever figured into her world; if she ever had a religion or was raised that way, it's gone now. The idea of the spiritual realm is in a big box of things that are above her paygrade, are things she doesn't need to concern herself with. So it all sounds very strange, that people could be so taken with these ideas that they would hurt Kurt. She can read between the lines there.]

I... Don't really understand that, but I don't think religion makes sense to me? But...

[Huh.]

General Ravani told me once that she was named after a devil? Hob. And the previous commander. Nick.

And I guess the sins are a religious thing? That's how the seven platoons were named. I'm Wrath.

[She's not sure what the point is, but it feels like something worth noting. Maybe Kurt will know what to make of it.]

Edited 2016-05-26 03:36 (UTC)

[Kurt wraps an arm around her shoulders, keeping the touch light for the sake of her back. He improvises by gently squeezing the bicep his hand's curled around.]

Doesn't to me either, especially with the world I came from. People who can look around at that world and still believe in a benevolent being in the sky.. [He's going to be polite and cut himself off now. Wrath should be very glad his temper has mellowed with age, or he'd be ranting for the next ten minutes.]

Hmm. Ja, Old Hob and Old Nick were names for the devil. Old Nick was a saint, too.. [When she mentions the sin and the naming traditions of the platoons, Kurt nods.] I'd wondered, when you introduced yourself. You're right, too; Wrath, Lust, Gluttony.. Acedia? Wait, no I think that was an older one. [He shrugs with his free shoulder.] My knowledge is contained to what I could use to taunt priests, and I grew out of that years ago. Mostly.

[That's... really nice. The arm around the shoulders. She wishes people would do that more often, but she knows she has problems being clingy, and it's dumb. So she's grateful that Kurt's indulging her.]

Maybe that's why it's not a thing on my planet. Like after the war and the bioweapon plague... yeah. People just party a lot. [Makes sense to her.]

Wrath, Envy, Avarice, Lust, Gluttony, Pride, and Sloth. [She could recite them in her sleep.] Envy was my partner. Octavian. Combat partner. Not the other kind.

[Kurt taunting priests. Gosh. She laughs and pokes him lightly.] That's not nice. Then again, if people aren't nice to you, fuck 'em.

[Meanwhile he's absently tracing the line of her upper arm with his fingers, or at least a section of it over and again. The urge to take her to lay down is strong; not to seduce her, though he would exactly protest, but the stronger desire right now is just to hold her, touch her skin and feel her touching his fur.]

Religion didn't much make it through the first war in mine, either. Erik, my team's leader, still celebrated some of the holidays, but for him it was cultural. He was from a religion whose people had been the target of a genocide, earlier in the century. I think he stopped believing then, but it was important his son knew his heritage.

[He listens, humming a soft acknowledgement when she explains her relationship to Envy.] Platoons named after sins and generals named after the devil. I suppose I can't talk; my code-name was Nightcrawler and when I formed a team I named it after a bullet.

[He chuckles, twitching away from the poke and then moving right back where he was.] I wasn't nice. I'm still not, I'm just nice to you.

[That makes her shiver in a very pleasant way. North never even really touched her like that. He hadn't been all that cuddly.]

Is your Erik the same as the Erik here? The one here is super cool. He could like rp my skeleton out of my body if he wanted to, isn't that awesome? [Erik has obviously impressed her. She's not in the last intimidated, just excited to know yet another person with cool powers.] ... Wait I guess it can't be the same one, because Charles told me they can't have kids because they live in the dark ages.

Well like the naming tradition for us is really old? My mobile infantry division is the Ghost Wolves, and before we were planetary army it was a colonial marine division for like a couple centuries. Anyway... Nightcrawler is an awesome name! What kind of bullet did you name your team after?

[Pffff he's plenty nice. People just say stuff like that because they don't want others to know they're nice. It's hurfdurf.]

[Kurt pauses with a glance at her face to check that shiver was a good reaction. Seeing that it was (or at least nothing to contest the point) he continues, his tail sliding down to loop companionable around her waist.]

Very like the one I knew, but much younger. The Erik in my world had at least thirty years on this one. [And now he's just going to blink at her, ignoring the hard twist in his stomach because surely he's jumping to conclusions.] ..Was? Why would they be having children? Do you mean that they can't take in any, because that's not the impression Xavier gave me. Every conversation, he mentions his school.

Nightcrawler is a worm! My team started calling me that after a bait maneuver that I was always the one to pull off. [When he was younger than the other Kurt here.] Ghost Wolves is much better. I.. named it after bullets for a .44 Calibre that I'd carved Xs on. I thought I was being funny.

[Definitely likes that. He gets a quick smile, a little happy wiggle against him.]

Um. No? Like. Okay when I come from babies come out of uterine replicators because it's way safer and less gross than people who have uteruses being pregnant, right? But also that means homosexual couples can have kids too, which is so great, because they can combine the genetics in the lab before the babies go in the replicators! And I guess they don't have uterine replicators when they're from so it's all. Um. Just like body births? Which is like the fucking dark ages! It's awful. And Charles said also people don't approve so it's even worse, which I don't even understand. Like. Um. How could two or three or four or whatever people of whatever gender or non-gender being in love and having families be upsetting, it's not like it's anyone else's business as long as they're all consenting adults and take care of each other and any kids they might decide to have. Relationships are weird and awful enough that anyone who can actually make them work should be able to, right?

[She has opinions, and all of this seems very logical to her.]

...oh, that's cool, though. Nightcrawler sounds way neater than a worm, but it's a fun story.

Edited 2016-05-28 01:14 (UTC)

[That's a shame, because Kurt's hand begins to slow as she rambles. In the beginning it's mostly surprise that technology like that is used for good purposes; he'd heard rumors McCoy had rigged up something similar in his laboratory of horrors, to take the untrustworthy human equation out of things, both in terms of keeping the unborn alive and having easy access to tweak before their unfortunate birth. Too many of the machines the X-Men had taken from the ruins of Apocalypse's strongholds had been far beyond their ken, but there had been holding tubes that could have supported fetal development. Jean had confirmed having eggs harvested from her when she was held captive, but they'd taken samples of everything when she was being processed for the breeding pits. And if McCoy'd had that technology--if Sinister had that technology, as they suspected, why keep the pits at all? (He knows why.)

His hand stops entirely when she shifts onto the topic of relationships, his brain flat refusing to parse any of it. Not even refusing to believe Wrath's anything but mistaken (that will come), but his mind flat refusing the puzzle clicking together because he can't. Erik can't be someone he can't trust, even when he's not Kurt's Erik and he should know better. It can't make sense when he thinks about his own Erik, how he'd cradle the photographs of Charles Xavier like they were his infant son's fragile head. He'd named his son after Charles, teamed them after the man.

(Deep down, hidden beneath the surge of nameless fear and shock, is a tiny spark of relief mixed with regret, because he could have told Erik after all. He could have told his mentor how his mother knew Destiny, and not had to pretend not to know her face.)

Kurt swallows hard, because Wrath is still there and expecting an answer. It comes quietly, more strangled in his throat than he'd like.] We don't.. There's nothing like that in my world.

[Wrath eyes Kurt with alarm.]

You look like you're gonna throw up. Do I need to get you something? Did you eat something bad?

[Does not even occur to her that the contents of the conversation could have upset him. How could any of this be upsetting?]

[Kurt shakes his head, even uncertain as to how much a lie that is. He feels like throwing up in reaction to the flood of emotions; he won't, because he's an X-Man dammit (Erik named them after Charles.) He knew this Erik was different, hard to forget with the massive age difference between the two men, but this amount of difference rattles the trust Kurt wasn't aware he'd placed in the man. His silence on the relationship is understandable, the world he came from isn't that much different than Kurt's own (he thought), but if he could hide that then what else is he?

He shakes his head, remembering a moment after doing it that he repeats his gestures. Sloppy, stupid. His mother taught him better.] I'll be fine, Wrath. I will. We just.. we simply don't have that in my world. I suppose you've been taking a bed a caveman, darling. [The endearment slips out, and a muscle jumps in his jaw when it does. He follows it with a smile, a very bright one for someone who just looked like they got slapped by a plant of wood.]

[Everything about this situation feels wrong, suddenly. It's alarming. And that smile? Even more alarming. What is even happening? The desire to just blindly accept everything Kurt says wars briefly with her instincts. It's not a pretty fight. It's that strange, bright smile that seals the deal.]

Don't bullshit me, Kurt.

[Maybe she's wrong. Maybe this is just him being upset about replicators, though that makes little sense. But if she's wrong, she will apologize.]

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Oh fuck

Dun dun dunnnnnnn (also I'm directly quoting AoA on the guns, idk how accurate it is)

oh god lemme make us some popcorn

extra butter on mine, please

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