driftfleet | 01. video.

Entry tags:

01. video.

Who: Tommy Magnus, and YOU
Broadcast: Fleetwide
Action: SS CAPRINE
When: 06/04

[ So. As far as Tommy's concerned, he's been born for this moment. For every hour Billy had him sit through the von Trapps caterwauling their way through their problems or whatever other corny classic shlock he was into, Tommy had retaliated with an hour of Big Brother and whatever other reality tv show trash had caught his eye.

So, being kidnapped from an impending disaster and being dropped into this seemed only a logical progression of fate. He figured that his mother would be there soon enough, ripping time and space asunder. So after grabbing a cup of pudding and giving a once-over of the ship, he knew what had to be done. Play along, roll with it, and hope that when the Scarlet Witch gets here she doesn't break the universe too hard.

Which leads him here. Stretched out, relaxed as can be. Might as well have some fun. He folds his arms behind his head, a playful smirk on his face. ]

Hello out there my soon to be loyal viewership. It's me - Tommy. But you can call me Speed if that's a little more your style. I'm honored to be part of this, clearly you received my audition tape and were as impressed with me as I am with all this. This is a total game-changer.

I'm in it to win it, and this season's going to be the best one yet.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ none of this is right. it stirs a memory -- like maybe some catastrophe she'd learned about in its wake, but never one she remembered on her own. kate shakes her head. ]

I have no idea what you're talking about. I didn't even think you were on Earth right now.

[ Something is wrong.

Really, really wrong. ]

That's because I'm on Battleworld. Y'know... where you are.

Uh, no. [ she steps back -- holding up a hand. ] I'm on Earth. Venice Beach, to be super precise about it. Because New York is now for dummies and I look way better with a tan and...

[ shit shit shit it's not her tommy, is it? kate swallows hard. ]

Quick. Tell me about the Young Avengers.

The Avengers? They're fighting for human liberation. I guess we'd qualify as young Avengers because we're a) young and b) also doing that, but...

[ He'd just had this conversation with Kitty. Hadn't he. He just... hadn't thought too much about it until now.

And now he can't stop. New York is definitely not a place he's been, at least not without an army of guards and an overprotective mother. ]

Kate, you know Genosha, right?

Of course I know it. [ who doesn't know genosha? ] But I've never been there.

[ -- kate shakes her head. ] The Avengers are fighting each other. As per usual. What are you talking about -- human liberation?

[ Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh hell, he's not even sure where to begin. ]

If you have to ask we're definitely not from the same Domain.

[ kate retreats into her room -- beckoning him to follow. he may not be her tommy, but he clearly knows her better than the other alts do. if he does follow, she'll shut the door behind him. ]

But you know me. Some version of me -- wherever you're from? [ it's a strange comfort. ] Look. Stay a while. We can sort this out.

[ she wants so badly to sort this out. ]

Of course I do! And like hell I'm going anywhere else, same Domain or not.

[ Where to... even begin. Doom help him. ]

I have no idea where to even begin. [ Why isn't Billy here. He lives for this. ]

[ that's the question, isn't it? where to begin. kate takes a seat on her bed; futz the differences, she gives a nod like he should join her. ]

Maybe you should tell me a bit about you and Billy. [ it sounds innocuous, but that'll help her drive at the heart of the difference. she thinks. especially with how casually tommy had thrown around the names of a few more family members. ]

[ Down he goes. Flopping like a sack of bricks. A leg automatically sets to jiggling. ]

Well, uh, as you - probably know? Our Grandfather is Magneto -- Erik Magnus, Baron of Genosha, which makes our mom Wanda Magnus. And keeping up with the tradition of speedy-magic twins, he's the nerd that does magic, I got the much cooler power of super speed. Oh, and I'm older, not that age really matters in the whole line of succession.

Hey, Tommy?

[ she folds her legs underneath her -- leaning forward so she can cross her arms against her knees. erik magnus? wanda magnus? kate shakes her head. ]

Could you tell me, like, your name? Your full name.

[ what do you wanna bet it's not thomas shepherd? ]

Magnus. Thomas Magnus.

[ here is as good a place as any to start-- ]

See, I know you as Tommy Shepherd. [ she avoids suggesting that she knows tommy shepherd instead. kate covets this connection; she doesn't want to jeopardize it. ] And I know Billy as Billy Kaplan. You're brothers, yeah, but you didn't know about each other for a damn long time.

What?

[ He can't fathom it. Honestly can't.

Billy has always been like his other half. They've done all the obnoxious twin things - secret twin language, secret twin hideouts, so in sync that they can finish each other sentences without even thinking about it. Growing up without him just wouldn't be... right. ]

Were we kidnapped?

Not exactly. [ -- not physically, at least. perhaps they'd been metaphysically kidnapped. ]

Look -- I'll tell you what I know. You grew up in Jersey, but I never held that against you -- [ an almost smile. ] You never told me your parents' names, but I think they split up when you were still a kid.

[ but she rushes to clarify: ] That doesn't mean you're not Wanda's kid, either. The explanation gets a little bumpy.

[ and she'll only give it if he wants it. ]

You know what, with my mom? It always does.

[ He's not surprised. There's a reason Wanda Magnus and her sons do as they please... but he can't imagine her without them either. They're her whole world, frustrated and angry as she gets with them in this rebellious phas. She's their mom and she'd do anything for them, absolutely anything.

How had losing them affected her?

There's at least some weird comfort knowing that he and Billy had found each other. And Kate. ]

So... I'm a Young Avenger, with you - and we fight against... what, exactly?

[ -- goddamn, she doesn't have the heart to explain that they don't currently fight anything. not together, at least. that the young avengers had had their halcyon days, and its members had moved on to other things. kate doesn't want to say it aloud; maybe she misses them all the more for having been stuck here for other a year. ]

Against all the things that need to be fought. You know, bad dudes. Conquerors. [ doom, once. ] Invading aliens. We formed at a time when the real Avengers weren't carrying their weight; we stepped up.

[ you stepped up. ]

[ We stepped up.

But none of that matches what he knows of the Avengers. They were powered people, yeah - he knew them all by name and followed them with something like hero-worship, wanting to do whatever he could to help because he believed in the cause. ]

But you're not fighting against mutants. Like - the societal divide between humans and mutants, or sapiens and superiors, whatever you want to call it. That's not a thing you have to deal with?

[ sapiens and superiors, huh? i mean -- it's not like she hasn't heard that kind of chatter before. even so, kate shakes her head. ]

As much as we'd want otherwise, I don't think you can ever fully stamp out that kinda prejudice. [ it's been better during kate's lifetime than it had been in the past; that's for certain. ] But I wouldn't call it a -- jeez, a societal divide?

[ maybe between the mutants and the inhumans, though... ]

[ Okay. Okay. Now this is where his brain starts to wrinkle. ]

So no... human re-education centers? No Sentinels?

[ -- look, they could talk sentinel horror stories until the cows come home. but! ]

Human re-education centers?

[ holy shit. ]

Magneto's idea of preserving the peace tends to involve brainwashing humans into loving the status quo. Which is "mutants rule". Things are less inequal than they were when things started, it was a nightmare after the war, but...

[ But. ]

It's still not right.

[ again, she thinks, holy shit. ]

So -- that's a pretty big difference. [ kate's head shakes; she's bewildered. ] Is that just in Genosha? What about the rest of the world? Who's just -- who's fighting?

Mostly. It's different in every Domain, but Genosha's one of the biggest and most influential so... I wouldn't be surprised.

[ And that right there is a loaded question. ]

Humans are rebelling against the unfair treatment. They're tired of being second-class citizens, and for good reason. You got the Avengers, or the Human Resistance Movement - Luke Cage, Hawkeye, Black Cat, Misty Night. And then you have whatever the hell is going on with Atlantis and Pietro, since he claimed he killed the old man but there's no way he'd be able to accomplish that.

-- And when you say 'Hawkeye'...

[ she trails off. he must mean clint, right? because that sounds like such a clint move. but, god, she's almost afraid to ask. ]

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