_kingofthedead_ (_kingofthedead_) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2015-04-29 21:53:00 |
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Entry tags: | kitty pryde (shadowcat), t'challa (black panther) |
Who: T’Challa and Kitty
When: March
Where: Pancake place
What: Talking about the Dreams
Rating/Warnings: Low, some discussion about bigotry
Status: Complete
Black Panther wasn’t one of hers, but he was one of the people from her dreams, and that made him one of hers. Kind of. As far as she was concerned. He was an ally, one of the few the X-men had really had. Even if he hadn’t dreamed as far as some others, he still knew people. And that was important to Kitty, important enough to extend a hand and make a friend. And at least give him some people who he could talk to.
She waited in the pancake shop, and wondered if he’d still look like royalty.
T'Challa entered the establishment in his customary black jacket with upturned collar. The morning was cool and he'd only realized after catching his reflection in the window of the pancake house how it vaguely resembled his panther outfit. He had smiled a little at the irony. He hoped this kind young woman would be able to fill him in on his dreams, and who Ororo was. It was comforting to find someone from the same dream world as himself, he was discovering.
He looked around for the young woman from the network whose name he'd actually never gotten. He spotted her waiting expectantly and strode over with a smile. "Good morning."
The jacket looked good, Kitty was jealous. “Good morning.” She stood up and held out her hand. “I’m Kate. Everyone calls me Kitty though.” Honestly, she’d given up trying to get people to just call her Kate at this point.
“Have a seat and order whatever you want.”
"It's a pleasure to meet you...Kitty. And thank you for taking the time to meet with me, I really appreciate it." T'Challa shook the extended hand with a firm, confident grip. "Are feline nicknames common in our world?" He smiled as they sat, the irony of both of their monikers not lost on him.
“Lets see. Shadowcat, Black Cat, Black Panther, Hellcat, Tigra…” Kitty ticked them off on her fingers. “Probably a few I’m missing. There’s a lot of bird and spider nicknames too. Animals seem to be popular.” She flashed a grin at him.
T'Challa grinned and then chuckled. "What a strange world we come from. Although culturally speaking animals have always played a part in mythology." He opened the menu and perused a moment. "What do you recommend?"
“Mm. I chose my codename after some … stuff happened to me in Japan. What’s your favorite fruit? I can never pick between the strawberry pancakes and the ones they make from real bananas.” Kitty ran her finger down the menu. “But you have to try their hash browns. They’re almost as good as their pancakes!”
T’Challa nodded wordlessly as Kitty explained her name origin. As she suggested items from the menu, T’Challa looked back at all the well photographed images of food. “I am partial to strawberries. I suppose I will get those with some bacon and those hash browns you are most enthusiastic about.” He smiled and set the menu down. The waitress came by shortly and T’Challa placed his order. Once that was done, he folded his hands together on the table and sat forward a little. He was anxious to learn as much as he could about their world and the dreams.
“So, we are from the same world, then? You and I, and the gentleman on Valar who knew Ororo but failed to give me his name?” He didn't’ know how to describe the man, except he was of few words, it seemed.
“That was Logan,” Kitty replied. She decided to leave to to Logan to tell T’Challa he was banging his ex-wife. Ahem. “And it sounds like it. At the very least Wakanda exists and there’s a man a lot like you. It’s possible you could dream of different events. An alternate reality from ours. We’ll have a better idea the more you dream.”
“Logan. Hm. I have not met a Logan yet, nor you, as a matter of fact.” He smiled a little wryly. “Isn’t it enough of an alternate reality that we’re dreaming of these lives? I don’t need to be dreaming of yet another parallel world within a parallel world. I was never very big on science fiction.” He chuckled and sipped at his glass of water. He grew a bit more settled and sat back. “What I have dreamed so far has mostly taken place in Wakanda. My young life there with my father, watching a man named Ulysses Klaw kill him with some sort of sonic weapon, and my rite of passage and ascension to the throne of my country. I’ve travelled abroad and gotten several degrees. I have also apparently invited a group of strangers to my country to test them, and they later become friends. The...Fantastic Four?” It sounded strange to even say it. Then again their world was anything but normal. “Most peculiar group. A family. Reed Richards is a very brilliant man, and we seem to hit it off after a while. I personally cannot say I’m a fan of his powers. It’s very...unsettling to watch a human stretch and contort themselves to impossible proportions.”
“I’ve done that.” Kitty grinned. “Another world within another world. Visited several. I like to pretend the one where the nazis won World War II hadn’t happened. Things weren’t that good for the me there.” She leaned forward. “I know them! We actually went to Reed Richards when my powers were on the fritz. He wasn’t able to help me until he worked with his arch-nemesis.”
T’Challa’s eyes went wide with wonder. “You...you’ve traversed parallel worlds in your dreams.” He shook his head a little, and gratefully accepted the cup of coffee that appeared before him from the waitress that drifted up to the table with it. He sipped at it then frowned as Kitty explained her travels. Having personally experienced the horror of attempts of genocide on his people in Africa, T’Challa knew all too well the hell that sort of thinking did to a society. “How unfortunate there is a world where such a reality exists. One would hope they would not. But I suppose that’s to be expected. Endless realities, endless possibilities, correct?”
Watching the young woman get excited over mutual dream friends, T’Challa’s eyes also lit up in kind. “Really? What...are your powers?” He was catching on that this was a common thing in their world. Ororo, the Fantastic Four, now Kitty.
“If you want, I could introduce you to Blink. She did the same thing much more than I did. But yeah, if you can imagine a world, something like it probably exists. I kind of think that this world is some kind of nexus. A place where other worlds bleed in. It’s… as close to an explanation for the dreams as I can think of.” Kitty waved her hands animatedly. “I mean. Powers, items. Costumes!”
She looked around, then calmly phased her hand through the table. “I can walk through walls.”
T'Challa supposed that made sense. This could simply be some sort of crossroads of worlds. It would explain all the strange posts on Valar and even his own experience receiving his costume.
T'Challa nearly spit his coffee out as he watched Kitty's hand just...go through the table. He was rendered speechless and just stared at her in open mouthed shock (after swallowing his coffee of course).
He swore softly in his native tongue then added in English, "What in all creation..." He blinked. "Can you do that through any surface?"
“The denser the material the harder it is for me,” Kitty explained. “I basically reverse the spin on my molecules which forces them to separate. But if I try to go through adamantium or vibranium its really hard. I’ve done it but it leaves me really weak.” Just casually name dropping the metals.
T'Challa didn't miss a beat. "Vibranium! So you know of this metal as well. So far I only know of it as a precious metal that is used in my country and coveted by outsiders." His dark brown eyes were dancing with curiosity as if this were Christmas. "How do people in our world acquire these magnificent powers? Do I have any? So far all I have is the intimidating costume." He smirked.
“I honestly don’t know. I’m sure ‘Ro does. The only thing I’m certain of is you’re incredibly acrobatic and strong. Olympic level at least. Could definitely give me a run for my money on agility.” She winked at him. “People like me, and Storm and Logan, we’re born that way. There’s a mutation in our DNA, an extra gene that gives us these special powers. And for me and some others, at least, one day we woke up with powers. A little at a time. One day I ran through a wall on accident, but I couldn’t repeat it for awhile.”
She felt a pang, missing her friend from that little adventure being chased by hopped up methheads. “Others get exposed to radiation, or cosmic powers, or terragin mists or… there’s a lot of way someone gets powers, honestly.”
It was a lot to absorb. Genetic mutations, impossible scientific scenarios. Every explanation only brought up more questions in his mind.
He chuckled softly at her description of his dream self's abilities. He'd gathered as much from his dreams where in them he took the heart shaped herb and his already honed fighting skills only increased in potency. He was more than a little jealous of his dream self.
"That must have been terrifying," he said of her running through a wall.
The food came and T'Challa leaned back so they could be served. When the waitress left he went right back to the conversation, far more interested in learning all he could rather than eating. "So what does everyone do in our world with these incredible powers? Is everyone in society affected like this? And who are 'Ro and Storm?"
“I kept waking up downstairs. Phased in my sleep. For mutants, it usually happens around puberty. So we get all the normal confusing body changes and then powers. If you’re lucky, that’s all you get. Some people end up… looking different too. And a lot of people don’t like mutants, even the ones that ‘pass’.” Kitty frowned. “By the time I was fifteen, I’d been in countless battles, space, killed a person in self-defense, been possessed and learned ninjitsu. There were people that wanted to put is in camps, exterminate us. And you know the really messed up thing? If you were lucky enough to get powers in an accident, or through science, like Cap or Iron Man or the Fantastic Four, people loved you. But if you were a mutant, people were afraid. They hated us. I’m Jewish, and a woman, and bisexual, and then you throw a mutant on top of that and I’m like a bigot’s worse nightmare.”
Kitty took a breath. She’d worked herself up and needed to calm down. “Sometimes I’m afraid of what’ll happen here. I’ve already fought some of the same enemies from my dreams. What happens if people start finding out just how weird the OC is? Then all of us Dreamers are going to face the same thing mutants did.”
Whatever questions, unanswered and otherwise, T’Challa had, suddenly vanished in the wake of Kitty’s explanation and rant. He could scarcely believe the United States, of all places, or any country in this modern age (save North Korea) would be capable of concentration camps on par with World War II. And to differentiate between people of powers made absolutely no sense to him, though it was not surprising, considering human nature.
His expression became solemn, though his eyes remained compassionate. “I know what it is like to be persecuted. I fled the Congo as a child when the First Congo War started. My parents were killed, my village scattered, I wandered with boys from other villages for miles, avoiding the monsters that wanted us dead or to enslave us in their so-called armies. Or worse. I was hated for what I was. And all I was was a child who happened to be Tutsi.” He reached out and gently placed his hand on Kitty’s. “But, I came to this country, and found that while you still have your struggles of bigotry, it is far more accepting than elsewhere, and it is changing every day. This world is not the same as our dreams, Kitty, and perhaps, in this regard, it is for the better. Whatever may come, if those outside the OC do notice us Dreamers, they will have to contend with a large community that is tight knit and unwilling to allow fear to rule the day.” Long practiced on speaking on behalf of his people before Congress and whoever would listen in the government, T’Challa was a force to be reckoned with when it came to issues of genocide and persecution. If things did go the way Kitty feared, he would be on the front lines in a heartbeat.
It was probably a lot of stuff to say at once, for both of them. Kitty actually felt exhausted by it. She squeezed his hand. “I think you’re right. I’m sorry you had to go through all of that. Far cry from being a king. It’s terrible what people will do to other people, just because you might have been born in the wrong town or village, or look different, or act different.”
T'Challa nodded, "Indeed." He finally remembered his coffee and picked up the mug to sip from it. "It's why when I can, I go before Congress to remind them of the plight so many in various African nations are going through." He sighed a little and then smiled a small, friendly smile. He could tell they needed a change in topic.
He decided to dig into his meal after all. His eyebrows raised and he said, "You were right. The hash browns are delicious." After a moment further in eating silence he couldn't resist asking. "So, Kitty, what can you tell me about Ororo?"
Kitty had considered politics, in both worlds. But her hands were so dirty that she doubted she’d stand a chance. She’d done too many questionable things. For all the right reasons, but still questionable. Of course the annoying part was that if it were a white christian man they’d get away with a lot of that! “She was like another mother to me. Or maybe a big sister. Smart, beautiful, ethereal… but she has a temper, and you don’t want to cross her.”
T’Challa smiled a little and tried to imagine the teenage version of Ororo grown up and all of those things. Already some of those characteristics were there in his dreams, but their youth added a sense of reckless abandon to their actions and behaviour.
“I hope I remember that in my future dreams,” he chuckled. He downed another forkful of pancakes. “You had mentioned a...Storm, earlier. Is that Ororo’s nickname? Since you and Logan know me, and her, may I ask...what becomes of us? That is....we must all work together for some reason, correct? I have only ever dreamt of us young, and don’t know when I see her again and in what capacity.”
“That’s her nickname, yes. Its kind of a codename, like mine is Shadowcat.” Kitty rubbed the back of her neck. “You two kind of keep… drifting together and apart. Reminds me of me and Rachel. Do you really want to know how it all ends up?”
T'Challa had been asking himself the same question since they'd set up this meeting. He still wasn't sure how to answer it. He frowned a little and poked at his food with his fork.
He then looked up and with a small, unsure smile said "I think I will abstain from playing Icarus and let the Dreams play out instead. I want to know very much, but am also afraid to know. The fact that I see Ororo again will be enough for me for now."
Kitty nodded her head. She wasn’t afraid to give people spoilers, but she also understood that some things one needed to experience for good or ill. “I’m sure you’ll find out before too much longer.”
T’Challa nodded wordlessly. He hoped so. Some days the suspense was killing him. Others simply were reminders about having patience. He started to eat again and before long their plates were finished. Leaning back with the last of his coffee between his large hands, T’Challa sighed. “This has been good. I hope we can do this again sometime, Kitty. It’s nice knowing there are others from my dreams. For once I don’t feel so alone.” He smiled a little, then sipped at his coffee.