Lorna Dane loves rocks and math (compassrose) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2013-10-28 17:23:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, billy kaplan (wiccan), lorna dane (polaris) |
Who: Billy Kaplan and Lorna Summers
Where: an ice cream shop
What: talking about the dreams
When: a couple Fridays ago
Warnings/Rating: g
Status complete
Lorna sat at the table and worked on a scarf for Alex. She was a little nervous, but tried not to let it get to her. Billy deserved to hear about the things he would dream, and the possibility that he had family closer than he thought. She wondered if they’d ever know for sure if they were related. Part of her hoped they’d get that closure, but largely she was okay with the mystery.
She had a milkshake in front of her, which she was sipping slowly.
Billy was looking forward to seeing Lorna, she was nice and he liked knowing somebody shared his dreams. Or at least had ones from the same world. He’d already recognised a few people on the net from the few dreams he’d had, mostly Avengers since he seemed to be a huge fan of them. Meeting Wanda had been pretty awesome and he could remember the excitement his dream self had felt.
Locating Lorna at the table he made his way over, “Lorna, hi” he grinned, “How are you?”
Lorna waved at him, smiling brightly. “I’m good! How are you?” She stood up, because he’d probably want to order ice cream, so he had to get in line.
“I’m great” Billy told her waving her down as she stood, “Sit, sit” he told her, “I’ll be back in a minute. Can I get you anything?” he offered.
Lorna laughed and sat again. “No, thank you. I’ll be working on this shake for a while.” She held up her cup to show him she’d already ordered.
Billy nodded and headed off to order, returning not long after with his own shake and taking a seat opposite her. “Hope I didn’t keep you waiting long” he said, “I got a call from Zelda so had to sort something out which meant I left a few minutes later than I planned to”
“That’s okay, I understand that you can’t always control your schedule. Luckily I’m used to amusing myself.” She smiled brightly at him. “So I guess I promised you a story, huh? Or at least an explanation.”
Billy smiled back, glad she didn’t seem to mind hanging around waiting. He nodded, “Yep, hopefully now it’ll make more sense after having my own dreams right?”
“That’s the hope, anyway.” Lorna said with a nod. “Okay, so you know a little about Wanda’s powers, right?”
“Probability and reality manipulation” he said remembering what his dream self knew, “So she can make things happen that wouldn’t normally. I think” he added somewhat hesitantly.
“Exactly.” Lorna said with a nod. “And so there’s this thing with her family. Ever since she was about your age she was on her father’s team of evil mutants, along with her brother. I think they expected a lot less evil stuff and a lot more getting humans to accept mutants as equals, but I can’t say for sure. Basically one way or another all of Magneto’s kids have enormous daddy and relationship issues.” Including her, which was just the luck of the draw, really. “Though I guess that’s pretty universal for mutants too, really.”
“But she must have redeemed herself because in my dreams she was part of the Avengers” Billy told her before shrugging casually, “I guess so. I don’t really know” His parents adopted him in the dreams and here so there were no daddy issues as far as he was aware so far for him and he didn’t know any other mutants yet apart from his encounter with Wanda.
“Yeah. She was a hero for a lot longer than a villain. I don’t think she was ever truly evil, honestly. I think she just wanted to be with her family.” She sipped her shake and thought how best to continue. “At some point Wanda had twin boys. Because our family is so extremely messed up she gave them up for adoption.” That glossed over a lot, but even Lorna was still piecing all that information together.
Nodding Billy listened, he got that. People went along with all kinds of things for their family. “Okay” he said slowly when Lorna mentioned Wanda giving up her children for adoption, he hadn’t known that. But then he guessed there wasn’t really any reason he would. He fanboy’d over her because she was an avenger.
Lorna took a deep breath. “I think you’re one of those boys, in the dreams. I’m not sure if it’s ever made certain, I’m still dreaming through them myself, but it’s kind of assumed that in the dreams you’re her son.” She sipped her milkshake, hoping this wasn’t a huge mistake.
Billy looked at Lorna in shock, he hadn’t been expecting that. He’d expected her to tell him more about the world they were in there and maybe even some more about the powers and people but this...this was a shock. “Are...are you sure?”
“I’m not sure, no.” Lorna shook her head. “Like I said, I haven’t finished dreaming and I don’t know if it’s ever made clear in that world or not. But I think it’s true. Your powers are similar to Wanda’s, and you look like her, if she was a young man. It’s not much, but unlike telepaths who’re a dime a dozen there’s nobody else who naturally has powers like Wanda’s.” Just like there weren’t any people who naturally had the powers she shared with her father.
He nodded slowly, “I guess I’ll find out huh?” he said trying for casual before letting out a breath, “Wow. I have to say I didn’t expect that. So wait a minute if it is true then that would make you my aunt, right? You said Wanda was your sister”
Lorna reached over and squeezed his arm. She knew that feeling. “Yeah. You have a cousin, too. Uh, not mine, Pietro’s. She’s named Luna, and she’s adorable.”
“It’s true then” he said, “About things here being the same as things in the dreams. You could actually be my real life aunt” He’d heard people say things on the net of course but hadn’t really thought it would effect him, apparently he’d been wrong. He’d never even considered trying to find his biological family but by coming here he’d done it anyway.
Lorna bit her lip. “Could be. I have some mixed feelings about that, and I’m sure you do too.” She didn’t want to think that her mother had cheated on her father with a man who could become Magneto. It was hard enough to swallow the fact that she wasn’t actually related to the man who’d raised her.
Billy nodded, “I’ve never wanted to know” he admitted, “I know a lot of kids who are adopted want to know who the people were who gave them up and why but that’s never been me. I love my parents, the people who raised me, I’m their son”
“I get that, believe me. I just didn’t want you to dream anything that may or may not confirm what I’ve told you and have you wonder why I didn’t say anything. If you want to ignore it all you won’t hurt my feelings, I like you whether you’re my nephew or not.” She shrugged. “I just wouldn’t be happy if someone knew something like that about me and didn’t tell me. My parents did that and honestly it’s kind of messed me up.”
“Oh no, I do appreciate you telling me” he rushed to tell her, hesitating for a moment before placing a hand over hers, “Really, I do. It’s just not something I ever expected, you know. But I guess like you say if I dreamed about it without any warning then it’d be worse. I mean I need to sort it out in my head but I’m glad you told me and that you’re my friend”
Lorna sighed. That was a relief. Family was a touchy subject, and she’d worried he’d be upset. “I’m glad too. You’re a good person. I really hope your dreams are better than mine have been.” She worried that he’d go through something like Genosha, or that he’d just be so mired in weird bullshit that he’d be unhappy with his dreams.
“Thank you” Billy said, “Gotta take the rough with the smooth I guess but I have Justin, my friends and you here so I’m hoping that will help me deal with whatever happens in the dreams”
“I think you’ll do fine. You have a good head on your shoulders.” She smiled at him, her cheerful mood recovered. “So how did you meet Wanda in the dreams?”
He smiled in return, glad she seemed okay now and happy to move on from that particular topic. “I was hanging around the Avenger’s Mansion. I’d just had the crap kicked out of me by a bully at school and Wanda was there and told me to stand up to them. That ‘everyone has some gift’. Guess she knew because it turns out I did”
That was interesting. Lorna didn’t have a high opinion of her siblings, but it was nice to see that maybe Wanda was a decent mother after all. “Yeah? So you have your powers in the dreams, now?”
Billy nodded, “I avoided the guy who’d beat me up but I saw him picking on someone else and I went to stop him. I electrocuted him when he turned on me again” he admitted, “It was pretty intense”
“That sounds horrible.” Lorna said, sympathetically.
“Yeah but it helped me learn that I had powers and that I had to be careful” Billy said, “And the guy recovered so I’m grateful for that”
“That’s good.” Lorna said, nodding at him. “The first time is rough no matter what you’re doing.”
“I’m hoping the next ones will be easier” he said, “Now I know the kind of thing to expect”
She nodded. “It’s going to be weird, but hopefully not too bad.” She chuckled a little. “It must be weird for you already. We’ve got all these Avengers, but I don’t think they’re dreaming of the same world.”
“It’s strange seeing people I know but don’t know” he told her, “Even stranger that they wouldn’t know why I know them even if I explained” he shrugged, “I tend not to overthink things if I can help it. It hurts my head” he joked.
Lorna giggled. “I know that feeling. You seem like you’re taking it all really well, so far.”
“I’m trying. I mean I can’t change what I dream right? But I can control how I react to it, mostly anyway”
“That’s true.” She nodded and sipped her milkshake. “Though sometimes you won’t be able to control your actions, maybe. The dreams are pretty powerful. They’re strong enough to hurt you.” She looked down at her shake. The memory of the genocide at Genosha was still hard to face.
“Like physically?” he asked, “If you get hurt in the dreams do you get the same injury here?” That was a little worrying, he’d never thought about that before.
“That can happen, yeah.” Lorna fidgeted a little. “Obviously you already know you can get your powers from the dreams, and some of the other stuff that happens comes through, too. In the dreams I lost my powers and someone implanted a chip in my spinal cord to give me a fake version of them. I dreamed about it happening, and when I woke up I had that chip. It interfered with my powers and made me sick.”
“Oh my god” Billy said, “I’m so sorry Lorna, you’re okay now right?” he asked in concern. Now he was a little more concerned. That kind of thing wasn’t easy to ignore no matter how much positivity you had.
“Yeah, I’m fine now. I got it taken out, there’s barely a scar.” She touched the back of her neck softly, as though she was reassuring herself of that. “But that’s just an example of how the dreams can mess with you.”
He nodded more solemnly now, “I didn’t think about it. I mean they’re dreams so I never thought they’d actually do stuff like that. Pretty dumb since you’ve already said we get the powers. There’s always a catch”
“There is, and sometimes those catches are really important. That’s why I’m glad you’ve got good people around you. It really makes all the difference.”
"I've got Justin and Zelda and others, as well as you. I'm definitely surrounded by good people"
“Good.” She smiled at him. That was the best she could do. Give him enough information to deal with things and make sure he had support around him to keep him going.