Back from the Hill

[ms_tique]

This is her third congressional hearing this week. Yesterday she was a twelve year old missing his lower legs, tomorrow she'll be a dock worker with fungus growing in his lungs, but right now, she's deliciously blue again.

The boys are out on assignment. She doesn't expect them back for another three days. For once, she has the entire lair to

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[dirty_muties]

There is a sudden knock at the entrance to her lair.

[ms_tique]

The boys can't be done this fast.

Her outer thighs unfold. She pulls out a matching pair of guns as she silently glides across the floor. She stops by the reinforced side of the doorframe and checks the exterior camera.

"Graydon?"

She flips the lock and opens the door, leveling one gun at his face. "Hello, son. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

[dirty_muties]

A chiding laugh.

"Put the gun away, mother. It probably wouldn't work on me."

He looks down, straightening his tie.

"What? I can't visit a relative? Really now. So rude, Raven."

[ms_tique]

She looks over his shoulder. There aren't any giant pink robots on her lawn. That doesn't mean they aren't up the road.

"You've never made a casual visit in your life. What do you want Graydon?"

She doesn't lower the gun. It might not hurt him, but taking out his eyes would at least slow him down.

[dirty_muties]

"I'm merely following my therapist's advice. She said talking to you might help me a bit. Your ghost tends to hang out in my psyche and quite frankly, I'd like to put it to sleep."

"How about we simply try to co-exist for the night and talk? Consider it like your usual impersonation jobs. You can pretend to be a decent mother, I can pretend to be a good son, and we can have a pleasant discourse."

[ms_tique]

"Therapy." Her voice drips with disdain. "If my ghost's lurking in anyone's psyche, it should be Rogue's. Don't tell me you've co-opeted her powers, too?"

Against her better judgement, she steps back from the door and lets him in. A holster grows out of one hip. She slides the left gun into place and lowers the right, though she doesn't switch on the safety.

"So. Started any new cults lately?"

[dirty_muties]

"That's funny, mother! Wonderful, amicable start! You don't see me asking if you've destroyed any innocent people, lately."

He settles in a chair.

"I've apologized for that multiple times. I had to apologize to Mr. Drake, just the other day. I'm trying to actually better myself. If I could take back the FOH thing, I would. But I CAN'T."

After a quick glance around, his eyes settle on her.

"You don't have any tea, do you?"

[ms_tique]

"Innocents are killed for free. I'm hired to take out dangerous people. I'm damn good at it, too."

She nods for him to follow her to the kitchen. Her usual seat is in the corner, in easy reach of the knifeblock, her chemistry set, and the surprisingly dangerous blender. She learned two new uses for it just last week.

"I always have tea."

She seats him in an open, difficult to defend position on the opposite side of the table. The pot's still warm from when Morph was around earlier. She adds more hot water to the leaves at the bottom.

"Mr. Drake? Do you mean Xavier's boy Robert? The one with the annoying ice powers?"

[dirty_muties]

"Indeed. Apparently, in one world, he is a zombie. Disturbing."

He takes in the numerous brik-a-brak in the kitchen, keeping an eye on her proximity to the utensils.

"As for why I came here, let's just say that seeing my younger self have a happy life has given me some hope as well. He showed up in the Nexus, recently."

He clears his throat and continues.

"I wanted to ask you some questions that I have always wondered."

[ms_tique]

"The zombie world where Erik ends up Captain America's appetizer or the zombie world where people domesticated seven foot long ants instead of horses?" This is why she stays in her own dimension. That and Antelope Men.

"Younger self?" She raises an eyebrow. Just what she needs two of them.

"You're welcome to ask. I don't promise to answer honestly."

[dirty_muties]

"Yes. At 7 or 8, I would guess. Natasha seems to have adopted him."

"I wouldn't expect you to."

"Why did you even have me if you were going to get rid of me? Given your control of your body, it would have been easy to abort me."

[ms_tique]

"Natasha." She blinks in genuine surprise. "Natasha has adopted a younger version of you. She's MET you, right?"

Raven adds some Rum to her tea. "Oh, that." She waves off his question. "Irene expected a girl. She was supposed to have Victor's strength and my intelligence, with reasonable odds of some sort of body related powers."

Her eyes narrow. "You were quite the surprise."

[dirty_muties]

"I was a good, sensitive child, Raven. Not that you ever cared."

He eyes the alcohol disapprovingly.

"That will just kill the taste."

He reacts to that name. "Ah, Irene. Destiny. I was shocked when I first heard that you actually felt for anyone but yourself."

"I'll bet I was. Anyway, for my next question, was it a personal quirk that you disliked about me so much, or was it simply that I wasn't what you thought I was going to be?"

[ms_tique]

"When you were born, I was already on wanted lists in twenty seven countries. It would've been a crap environment for a good, sensitive child."

She snorts at his disapproval. "When I was a girl, the only way to sanitize water was to add alcohol. Ministers and working men all had a pint of beer for breakfast. It was that or die of dehydration." She takes a sip of tea. "And before you tell me hygiene has improved with the times, my body naturally filters out toxins. I can't get drunk unless I concentrate on it."

"You really do view the world through a tiny pinhole, don't you? Irene and I had forty five good years together." She's feeling twitchy. This is the second conversation about her in one night.

"It wasn't a matter of like or dislike. Infants don't have a lot of personality. I knew a human child wouldn't survive our lifestyle. We put you in what I have told you again and again was a ridiculously expensive boarding school with excellent reviews."

[dirty_muties]

"I don't know what kind of reviews you read on that school, but the ONLY place they excelled was education. They had practically NIL, when it came to good counselors or handling students' problems. The place was an emotionless vacuum!" he said, slamming his hands on the table.

"The older kids ruled the roost when unsupervised, and we always got our asses-kicked by them, and the few times you did check up on me, you treated me like a goddamned leper! Do you actually think that your money was doing anything good for ME?!"

[ms_tique]

She gives him a level stare. "Honestly? I didn't care. I had problems of my own."

She pours another cup of tea. "I've never been good with children."