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[Finally someone speaking his language.]

Do you want some help with that?

What kind of help?

[She's willing to accept help from him now after the rescue, otherwise she might very well have left Erik off this particular broadcast.]

With training. The point is to do it as a group, right?

[Working together, not killing, she wants to say, but they already agreed they're not speaking of that incident again.]

And maybe with a little less electricity this time to start.

[He doesn't kill all the time. Just...most of it.]

Then it's a good thing that none of us has that particular ability.

A very long talk is in order. [she's not wrong.]

Anyway, I second the motion.

I don't want you getting hurt again. If we hadn't been there... [She can't get it out of her head. She may not know Lorna very well yet, but she's still family. And Wanda's not losing another sibling.]

No one should have been alone at all.

[Is she maybe getting a tiny lecture from Wanda? Because that's kinda what it sounds like. OOPS way to go Lorna. She might feel a little bad now.

And Wanda still. Is not wrong.

So there's that too.]

Ideal plan is maybe dipshits not working everyone up to go charge in without a plan. I went in to make sure people who did rush in all worked up didn't get wrecked... but all of my limbs remained intact and I promise not to make a habit of it and will instead smack the dipshit who suggests such plans in the future?

I know. I only followed when I realized what everyone else had done.

[And honestly, a panicked Wanda throwing in 'and I can't find my sister' is probably the only reason the Ingress officials even let her through.]

I am not going to tell you not to go if you feel it's best. Just tell me next time?

I'm not going to argue against training or a need for it, I think it's a good idea in general. But I wonder what we'd be training for.

[Natasha goes quiet a moment, clearly choosing her words carefully.]

Is this self-defense on a larger scale or is this planting ourselves between the people here and...whatever they'd need defending from? Because those are two very different sets of skills to work on.

I don't know. A few months after I was brought to the Moira, the Hulk destroyed a planet. But we have also had to fight people who came for us.

It is...quieter here, but it doesn't feel like we're safe.

[Natasha's eyebrows lift a little, but she honestly doesn't look all that surprised. That pretty much sounds like the Hulk.]

I don't think anywhere is ever really completely safe. Human, alien nature, whatever you want to call it. Eventually, something will go bad.

[Such a bright outlook. She clears her throat a little and glances away briefly like she's slightly embarrassed about letting that out.]

But getting people to work together so that everyone's got a better chance at backup. I don't think there are any downsides there.

[It was an accident...but there wasn't much anyone could do when the Hulk was rampaging on a planet literally made of glass.]

Bad things have already come through the Ingress. We have nothing to lose by being too prepared.

Agreed.

[She lets out a long exhale, looking thoughtful.]

Depending on how many people we're talking about, we're probably going to want to start with smaller groups first. Trying to get a dozen or more people pointed in the right direction is usually an exercise in frustration.

Especially people who aren't used to this. I don't think everyone needs to come every week, just often enough that the next time there's trouble, they'll know what to do.

No. But we should make sure that it's different people every time. Would defeat the purpose if everyone only knows how to react if they're next to one specific other person.

[There's a brief pause.]

Is there a reason you want to confine it to just this group?

Edited 2017-05-25 18:07 (UTC)

Because I trust these people.

[Wanda's gone to great lengths to conceal the full extent of her abilities from everyone else and she imagines she can't be the only one who doesn't want just anyone knowing their specific weaknesses.]

Fair enough. If you give me a list of people interested, I can start putting together ideas.

And what was it that we all wanted?

[It's quieter than maybe it should be. Tired and frustrated and not nearly as combative as the whole idea makes him feel. He's been told one too many times what he supposedly comes to conclude. Coming away from this with wads wounded in more ways than the obvious, the idea still leaves him wary. And that's exactly how it sounds.]

We want everyone to be safe, yes?

[Look, if half the house is going to run off to try to be heroes, at least they can be prepared heroes. And Wanda wants to save them from learning the hard way if she can, if this wasn't already enough of a lesson.]

Of course. Which is why I run a school, not a vigilante organization. Control, not offense. Even if some of that has been apparently lost along the way.

[Oh, Charles.]

You may be ready for this. These kids are not.

[~~Not that he knows about, anyway.~~]

They are going to go anyway, with or without training, and I can't be everywhere.

[She knows them too well and they have that same drive she does. Charles can scold and fuss all he wants, but that's not going to change anything if the injustice they see is too great.]

And bad things have already come through the Ingress. Telepathic things. How long before those come after us?

[She shakes her head.] We aren't safe here.

And there are plenty of us that aren't children.

[A sigh. Even this much feels like more of a concession than he wants to give, but it's better than the alternative. He can admit that much, at least.]

If you know that, you know this only ever results in people getting hurt.

That never saved anyone. Fire doesn't care. Bullets don't care. And if the planet cracks open it won't matter.

[He's not Sokovian. He doesn't get it; he hasn't seen his entire world literally crumble away and leave nothing but a crater in its wake several times over. There is a reason Strucker was never short on volunteers - given the choice, they'd all rather go down fighting than wait for the next round of explosions and unrest.

She wants to save the others from knowing that with everything she is, but withholding basic survival skills just seems like a recipe for disaster in their current situation. It's not as stable as it appears at first blush.]

I am not saying they should be going and fighting or what happened last week was the right thing to do. But people who went to get them back got hurt and we still couldn't find them.

Wouldn't you feel better knowing they had some training in what to do if there's trouble?

Yes, I would. But there isn't safety in weaponizing the people you care about. What about that is right?

Edited 2017-05-25 19:34 (UTC)

Weaponizing?

[It's clear he's hit a nerve - what the hell does he know? He wasn't tricked, experimented on, and then locked up in a cage by actual monsters. She couldn't even tell Pietro what was really going on because he absolutely would have done something rash and she knew what Strucker would have done to him if he wouldn't cooperate. And even once they escaped and she was supposedly one of the 'good guys' now...she still hears the echo of weapon in others' minds. She doesn't need an Infinity Stone to be the most dangerous of all of them so some people will never see as more than the Scepter given flesh.

She hates it. It's part of why she's locked this video in the first place and gone to such lengths to conceal the full extent of her abilities from the world at large. She doesn't want to be looked at like that again and she certainly wants better than that for the others.

So being accused of being no better than Strucker cannot stand.]

You think I would wish that on someone else? Don't talk about things you don't understand.

[He would have to be devoid of both key senses over this video communication to fail to understand that the word has struck harder than he'd perhaps intended it to. It's a point of frustration: the last thing he's wanted to do here is add to the hurt, but backing down here might be one of his most obvious failures.

If that long fall hasn't begun already.

There is a moment, fleeting, of deep pity as he stares back at the feed. Whatever hurt is here, it's not so terribly different from what he's heard of before, is it? (And with the revelation of both her relationship with Peter, and Peter's to Erik...it makes such tragic sense, and he hates himself for how necessary it feels to push back). His expression steels, as much as the sorrow allows, looking more like false bolstering than it mimics any sort of real strength.]

How is it any different? [It's softer than it should be, but still aggravatingly insistent.] Wanda--I'm not here to argue who's had it worse. Truly. I wish it wasn't something we had to relive at all. But if you sincerely don't wish this on anyone else, you must realize that asking this of children who don't--and frankly we should wish they never do--have your experience solves nothing. The cycle doesn't end, we just add more hurt onto what already exists.

You can't ask me to allow this. To sacrifice their lives and call it "good" when it isn't. I don't want them to live in fear, I just want them to be able to live.

Edited (ugh i forget words so often, fml) 2017-05-26 02:59 (UTC)

No one is going to put them in a cage. No one is going to make them find trouble or send them into danger or force them to do anything.

[It's almost like they're not having the same argument, like he's trying to dress her in someone else's ideas.]

I told you, it isn't safe here.

[The Savrii think genocide is acceptable given a set of conditions - she's seen them trying to recruit people to go to Thiri to do pretty much what Chara wanted to do the outpost. And even setting that aside, who can forget the terrible fire last month elsewhere on Kauto? Or the way the Caducans chased them across the galaxy? Or how dangerous some of these unexplored planets have turned out to be?

Unless Charles intends to forcibly confine Jean, Kurt, and Laura to the mansion, it just seems terribly irresponsible to stand on principle and act like everything's great. If they want the training]

Pretending that it is doesn't change that.

It isn't safe anywhere. I'm not blind to this.

[But flying with much-reduced vision, at the very least. Like with fogged up headlights, a splintered windshield, and heavy rain: he knows the moves, but he lacks the ideal understanding of his surroundings. It's a reason for caution; driver's education--so to speak--only counts for so much if the car keeps breaking down, or it's a blocked off road, or god forbid there's a freak accident.

He swallows heavily, vision downcast under a furrowed brow. The communication may already be filtered (for whatever good it will do if this is already the level of danger she seems to think), but the second half of the response is locked to them personally. It's only here that his gaze drags back upward, his eyes rimmed with red, the only visible sign of threatening tears.]

Are you familiar with how a draft works, Wanda? [The pause he gives is brief, his breathing growing unsteady.] My first class wasn't. None of us were prepared. There was no bribe big enough, no excuse valid enough, save for a very clear disability. [And if he could have left instead of all of them...] It was a death sentence in waiting, and no amount of training helped. None.

Teachers. Students. As long as they were fighting age, it didn't much matter, did it? I watched some of the best and brightest and most vulnerable lives of a generation wiped out over the advent of televised war journalism and could do nothing but hope that their gifts would be an advantage. One by one, they disappeared, or died, or they were abused to create weapons meant to kill everyone like them.

I know you think I couldn't possibly understand the weight of this. [With another unsteady inhale, he's barely holding the flood of emotion at bay.] And on a personal level, you're right. I felt everything, but it didn't happen to me. It happened to those I was responsible for.

And I failed. I cannot do that again.

[And suddenly everything makes sense. He doesn't seem to be hearing her because he's really arguing with some darkness in his past, but although Wanda immediately regrets her earlier harsh words, she can't back down. She is tired of always being just the barest step ahead of disaster at best.]

What choice do any of us have? [Now it's her turn to be speaking almost too softly.] You know they will go again. And unless you stop them...

[Her emotions have been raw since Peter disappeared and this has been the only thing to drag her far enough out of her melancholy to get an actual reaction, much less get her to leave the mansion. She's had one foot in bad memories all week and Wanda might honestly rather crawl over broken glass than try to talk about them.

It's a convoluted story even without the attached emotions and really, wouldn't it just sound like empty excuses? You don't get the luxury of miscalculating, or trusting the wrong person, or being blinded by past pains when you can break the rules of reality as easily as breathing.

Maybe this is when she should walk away, but she's already let these people in and it still wouldn't change anything. She still cares, and not being around to see them get hurt won't magically keep them safe.]

My brother is dead because I let him go, because we thought we knew what we were doing but we didn't. [Her voice is definitely wavering but she is not going to cry about this in front of Charles, even though he could easily take whatever context he wants from her mind right now. She might not even bother with a token resistance.] I can't watch that happen again. Not here. Not to them.

[He has enough decency to know that's not something to pry into. The feeling from across the mansion is more than enough to understand enough of the context to realize exactly what nerve it was that he'd happened to carelessly strike. And yet they both seem to be hitting similar buttons for each other for something almost ridiculously pedantic. At the core, she's...right.]

Wanda, I'm-- [There is no way to say this that won't sound off.] --sorry. I didn't... [What, Charles? Know? He knows he never asked, never really tried to delve into it, and whose fault is it that he didn't put the pieces together when he'd had most of them to start with?] think.

[He sighs, and as his shoulders slump, he can feel the tension that's wound in through the course of conversation. The desperation, at least, seems to dissipate, but it leaves the upset behind, woven into every minor ache.]

I think you're right. [In part, at least. That unwillingness to repeat loss speaks to that enough. It wouldn't be the first time he'd agreed on some fundamental pain while disagreeing, also fundamentally, on how that should be handled.] I do want to see them safe. I just...

[With one just coming out of a week-long coma that has his nerves frayed, and two more battered and bruised and just barely still breathing, all he can do is worry.]

I sincerely worry that they're not ready.

[She feels raw and too exposed and all Wanda wants to do is shut off the feed and go hide under her blankets until everything stops being So Much. But that would be an actual cause for concern, and then people might come looking, and she just doesn't have the energy to deal with that right now. She only has the energy for these conversations at all because they're so necessary.]

All we can do is give them tools and hope they won't need them.

[It's here that his voice grows quieter, in the dawning of that realization that she has...more of a valid point than he wants to admit. When she hasn't ever been the only one saying it.

Maybe it really is something he needs to consider?]

They already have them, don't they? [A soft sigh. There's already pain here, pain that been torn back open and rubbed raw and might never scar back over.] It's control they need. Still.

[And he's likely failed everyone in that regard if this is the case.]

Control, practice...we need to know our limits.

[That's how people get hurt, right? Overconfidence and no real experience with how one's abilities respond to repeated use. Wanda can keep going indefinitely, for example, but Pietro had to stop and catch his breath eventually.

She can't help but wonder what would have happened if she hadn't been overconfident then. If they had stayed together, would he still be alive today?

If they don't give the others every advantage possible, will Charles find himself in the same position soon, wondering if he could have done something different to save Jean or Kurt or Laura? It's a toxic downward spiral, one Wanda would save him from if she can.]

I don't know what else to do.

I don't either.

[It's said with a long-suffering sigh, but he's at least no longer arguing. The last time he'd done this, he'd ended up with a couple bodies, several lost friends, a betrayal, and the loss of his legs. He can suffer the latter. It's the losses that still scare him.]

I just wish there was a better alternative.

[ The proposition itself, and the reasoning behind it - Tony vaguely recalls having a similar conversation, not long after the Ingress had first spat him aboard the Moira. "It's dangerous here, we're better off as a team." True, that didn't exactly happen.

Guess that doesn't mean it still couldn't. ]

It'll be like herding cats. Superpowered cats.

It would not be the first time. [Because that's pretty much an accurate description of the Avengers.]

That's fair.

[ The Avengers are a goddamn mess, and he says that as somebody who loves them dearly. ]

Don't mistake my quips for discouragement, I'm all-in on the idea. It's just good to set initial expectations reeeal low.

[That earns a snort of laughter from her. Where's the lie?

~~There is no lie.~~]

So that you can impress everyone?

[ There isn't a single person in denial about it tbh ]

Hey, hey. It's worked so far, why fix what ain't broken?

Because it is not what we are supposed to be doing? You can't stop a disaster by impressing it.

[But despite her words, there's genuine amusement in her voice.]

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;_;

ouch ;;

Apologies forever ffff

oh dear...

WELP

;~;

[private; personal feed] sorry for the teel deer

[private; personal feed] yum teal deer

[private; personal feed] honestly they both need an intervention.

[private; personal feed] ughhhhhHHHHHHHHHH

[private; personal feed] /lays down tbh

[private; personal feed] get the llamas stat

[private; personal feed] <3

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