(Untitled)

[charminglioness]

Lily Evans is sitting on a bench, on a street near the Gauche. She's managed to use a combination of warm winter clothes her ability at Charms to hide her wings, and is currently bundled up from head to toe so only her face is visible

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[screwattack]

Samus is walking back to the Gauche from work, carrying a plastic bag of assorted essentials, when she sees the redheaded girl sitting on the bench. She almost passes by, oblivious, when she realizes the young woman is crying. Well, one can't fault Samus for retaining her good samaritan instincts, even in this strange new world, she supposes.

Pausing in front of the bench, she looks down at the young woman. "Are you all right?" she asks gently.

[charminglioness]

Lily looks up, sniffling. "Hullo. I'm...well, no, not really."

There's a pause, where Lily tries to find a way of asking the other woman if she's a Wanderer, without having to resort to a Memory Charm afterward.

"Homesick," she says eventually. "I'm not from around here."

[screwattack]

"Ah, I see," Samus says, nodding her head knowingly. She's pretty sure this girl is a Wanderer, herself, but she isn't going to flat-out ask, either. "I'm not from around here, either," she says, trying to sound understanding, hopefully dropping the hint that she's a Wanderer herself.

"I think I can understand the homesick feeling, to a certain extent," Samus adds. "There are things back in my...home that I wish I could have access to here, even if I can't return there."

[charminglioness]

Lily perks up a little, eying Samus a little more carefully.

"I was supposed to get married. Before I came here," she says, and hopes Samus will read between the lines and figure out that she can't still get married because her fiance is, you know, in another universe.

[screwattack]

"Ah. I'm sorry," Samus says, although it sounds hollow even to her. She can sympathize with loss, certainly, but not the part about lost love.

"I take it you came in through the Rift," she adds, the huge hint meriting no more beating around the bush. "It does find a way to take people at the worst moments, doesn't it?"

She leaned over, since it was awkward towering over Lily while she was sitting, and offered her hand. "I'm Samus Aran."

[charminglioness]

"Lily Evans." Lily shakes hands, looking relieved. "Yes, I did come through the Rift. And it gave me wings. Butterfly wings. I'm using magic to hide them at the moment....I'm a witch."

[screwattack]

"Oh," Samus says, blinking a little. "I...see. Well, I don't see the wings right now, but...figuratively, I see."

Well, if they were sharing now, she might as well. "I came through the Rift a while ago. I'm a bounty hunter. Well, was, I suppose. The Rift seems to have given me the ability to cook, which I had never done before coming here."

[charminglioness]

"A bounty hunter, really?"

Lily is intrigued.

"That must be a fascinating job."

[screwattack]

Samus shrugs. "It has its ups and downs," she answers. "A lot of working alone. Difficult missions for little pay. But I see a lot of interesting places, and as long as I don't end up having to destroy them, that's fairly enjoyable."

Samus shivered a bit. "Sorry, I don't do too well in cold. Do you live in the Gauche? We could talk inside."

[charminglioness]

"Oh...here..."

Lily pulls her wand out and puts a Warming Charm on Samus, smiling.

"There. Yes, I live in the Gauche."

[screwattack]

Well, that was...different. Samus doesn't even know what a "witch" is, let alone "magic", and she's not sure how she feels about being suddenly warmed up. On the one hand, being warm is nice, but on the other hand, she's not terribly happy with people altering her body somehow without her consent. That's sort of how she got so intolerant of the cold in the first place, amongst other things.

"What did you just do?" Samus asks, standing up suddenly. "Some sort of metabolism adjustment, or redirecting my blood flow away from my core? That's dangerous!" She's torn between storming inside before the potential negative effects set in and waiting for an answer, but waits for a moment longer.

[charminglioness]

"No, not at all!" Lily holds up her hands in surrender, looking apologetic. "It doesn't...it changes the airflow around you, that's all. It doesn't alter you. It's like a localized warm air bubble that follows you around...I'm sorry, I didn't think before I used it, we use them all the time back home..."

[screwattack]

"Oh. I see," Samus says, relaxing her posture a bit. She briefly wonders if she was overreacting, if this is one of those things that's common here that she's not terribly familiar with yet, but lets it go.

"We don't have anything like that where I'm from," Samus explains. "Closest thing to it is my Power Suit is temperature controlled, to compensate for incredibly hot or cold climates."

[charminglioness]

"I'm sorry if I spooked you. I have to remember that there's not much in the way of magic around here and people aren't used to it. We were having a war, in my world, before I came here, and a little earlier today somebody startled me and I hexed the poor dear."

[screwattack]

"No, it's all right. I'm just...a little touchy. I'm sort of at a disadvantage here," Samus explained. She nodded at the explanation of war. That, at least, she could understand, and how it made even good people more trigger-happy than they would ordinarily be.

"There's something of a war going on in my world, too," Samus explained. "So I get how that goes, and how it can make you do things without thinking. It's all right, really."

[charminglioness]

Lily smiles, gesturing toward the door so they can go in. "I'm glad you feel that way. I've got no small number of magical workings going on in my room here, I'd hate for it to put you off."