8135/Brotherly Advice

Brotherly Advice
Date of Scene:	02 July 2019
Location:	Unknown
Synopsis:	Summary needed
Cast of Characters:	Marvel Girl, X-Man

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Marvel Girl has posed:
The most recent X-Men mission to deal with the Sentinels was...well, it can probably be called a qualified success. Rachel's team worked out all right at least. But it brought up some old memories, feelings, and thoughts. And Rachel knows how telepaths are better than anyone else. So rather than let it all stew, she reaches out for a little help from the safest front.

<< Hey, Nate? >> there's a light touch of her mind. << You got a minute to talk? >>

X-Man has posed:
    The touch of Rachel's mind feels at once foreign, and yet familiar. An odd paradox that Nate has yet to become accustomed to. But not one that he necessarily minds, so much. It's not unpleasant, that strange sense of soothing that he feels. And she, in turn, will feel that strange, almost bubbling thoughts that roil about in his head. No true focus, but turbulent. Confusion. Pain. Uncertainty.

    It all stills, the moment that her voice reaches his mind, cutting through his introspection. Like a placid lake. Cool, calm and dark.

    <<For you? Always.>>

    Almost immediately there is the sound of knuckles rapping against her door, where just outside, Nate now stands, leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded across his chest. Which is, of course, left bare. It seems that the only thing he has decided to wear today is a pair of black leather pants, with stitched in panels of reinforcement here and there, including X marks on the knees.

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Hey," Rachel greets at the knock on the door, opening it with a faint smirk of her own. "You're ridiculous," she notes at his attire (or lack thereof) with a sort of fondness nonetheless. She steps back to let him inside, tipping her head toward the room.

"Sorry if you were busy," she adds. Here in her room, in the mansion, she's more casual than she usually is in the rest of the world, her armor down. Jggers and a tank top are the order of the day, barefoot as well. "I just...things are kind of weird, and I need to get it off my chest before someone else picks up on it, you know?"

X-Man has posed:
    "Ridiculously awesome, you mean," He says with a scoff as he lifts himself from the doorframe and gives Rachel a playful wink. He strides inside as she makes way for him, lacing his fingers together before him, and then raising his arms up above his head to stretch out languidly.

    "Nah. Not busy. Just kind of... stewing in my own head. Really. It's good. You're saving me lamenting over pretty Russian blonde girls that I never should have looked at to begin with."

    He doesn't ask permission, before he turns and kind of hops back onto her bed, leaning back and to the side, propping himself up on one elbow. His crystaline blue eyes turn on to the redheaded psychic girl, and he lifts one eyebrow when she speaks. He sort of cocks his head in the direction of the bed beside him to indicate that she should join him.

    "Alright. Tell me what's up."

Marvel Girl has posed:
Rachel quirks a brow. "Illyana?" she guesses. "Yeah, that was a choice." Rachel is clearly not the best source for emotional advice. She doesn't take his invitation just yet, pacing a slow path across the open space in the room.

"So...with all this stuff with the Sentinels, Kitty said something the other day that just...it sort of made sense, but it also made all this seem a //lot// more pressing. She said this Sebastion, this source of the problem with the Sentinels, said he came from the future. And the stuff about how he's made? It matches up with the project I was trying to put down before I ended up here. And I can't help but think, what if I'm the reason he's here?"

X-Man has posed:
    "Let's... not speak her name," Nate says with a shrug, his face twisting up into a pinched expression that looks as if someone had just kicked him in the junk. He just sort of waves a hand as if to ward off any further talk about the subject, and instead settles back down to listen to her speak.

    And that's some story to be told, short though it may be. Nate just turns his gaze away from her, peering between the burgundy drapes to stare out the window as he scowls in thought about it.

    "I wouldn't read that much into it, Ray," He says at last, giving a faint nod of his head. Slapping the mattress, he pushes himself up off of it, because if she's not going to sit, he's going to have to come to her to soothe her. At least, if he's going to do so in a way that normal human beings should and would. So, he approaches her, and reaches out, placing his hands on her shoulders. His chin tucks in, so that he's looking upwards, into her eyes.

    "Let's think about this for just a second, yeah? So like... You're from this dark, alternate timeline where mutants have all but been hunted to utter extinction. Meanwhile, I'm from this dark, alternate timeline where mutants, under Apocalypse, have literally dominated all of North America, and almost crippled the rest of the world. And still, we know of others, don't we?"

    His fingers squeeze, kneading Rachel's shoulders gently, as he continues, "So, while it might be something similar to your future timeline, the chances of that are actually really really kind of slim. It might be a similar timeline, but not necessarily yours. And even if it is your timeline... That does not mean that you are responsible for it. You're not Sarah Connor."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Yeah, maybe." Rachel stares at the floor, not yet willing to meet his eye. "I just...I'm on edge." She rolls her shoulders away from his hands, stepping back and starting to pace again. "And it- it takes me back to-"

She draws a deeper breath, finally turning back to look at him. "We went to that factory the other night, Nate. And we got inside, and it was like I was back there. Back then. Whatever. Like the part of my brain that's been here, that's realized there can be a whole other world just...went away. I was back in that warehouse, ready to just...blow them up along with myself."

"And then I was thinking about who I am. Am I the Hound? Am I the freedom fighter? Am I- I don't even know who the hell I am here, except some sort of complication for everyone. And the old men, the one that was part of the resistance, she'd stay focused on the mission to the end, but //god// I just want to go and do something stupid and destructive and..."

X-Man has posed:
    "Rachel," He says, his voice becoming hushed, laced thick with concern and sympathy. His expression is crestfallen, almost mournful. His lips pull down at the corners, and his eyebrows arc upwards just over the bridge of his nose, but nowhere else. His eyes fixate upon hers. "That's... I get that. Everytime I see people with power lording it over those who don't, I immediately see Apocalypse and his horsemen. Sinister. Mikhail. Holocaust. Candra. Abyss. I see the wastelands of America just... superimposed upon this world. It's... They call that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. And it's not that uncommon. You're not alone."

    His attempt to soothe having been shrugged off, Nate finds himself feeling awkward about what to do with his hands. He wrings them together for a few moments, before finally settling on shoving them into his back pockets.

    "You're not the Hound. You're not the Freedom Fighter, either, Rachel. And you're... WE are not complications. It's hard to let go of the past. Especially when we find ourselves sucked back into it so easily... But we are more than the roles we've played in the past. Here? Here you're Rachel. Rachel who has a chance at a fresh start. Rachel who has value because she's seen what goes wrong when the dream fails. Rachel who has a chance to grow beyond the Hound and beyond the Freedom Fighter to become... Rachel. A person. Someone who can have a life. Have dreams of her own. A future that is her own to shape."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"I don't..." Rachel reaches up to scrub her hands over her face, eyes screwed tightly closed. "I don't even know if I want those things. Maybe that's the problem."

She lets her hands fall, taking a shaking breath. "When I went into that factory, back then. I expected to die. I was ready to die. When Kate and I got trapped, I thought that was the end of it. And instead I ended up here, and now I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to do with any of this. Because if I focus on anything other than the mission, then it's something else they can take away. And I'm not ready for that, Nate. I'm not."

X-Man has posed:
    "You realize how silly that is, Ray?" Nate retorts, though his tone of voice is not derisive or mocking. It's sad. "You can't just not live life because you're too afraid people are going to take it away from you. Do you know why? Because then you're just letting them take it away from you."

    He lowers his face, scuffing a bare foot on the floor and breathing in a deep breath. It expands his proud, strong chest, and as he releases a sigh, the muscles relax and sink back in on themselves to a resting position with a sort of fluid manner. "I mean, at that point, you might as well let yourself enjoy what you can while you have it, rather than just letting yourself be miserable all the time for not having it, right? Like..."

    He turns his face upwards, canted to one side so that he can look her in the eyes once again. Reaching up, he slides his fingers through the streak of platinum silver bangs, back into the ruddy chestnut locks behind them. "You're already just making yourself miserable. So, instead... Live. Have a life outside the mission. Spend some time discovering what it is to be you, and who you are. Free of the rest. No masks. No reservations. No hang ups. And if anyone ever tries to take it away from you..."

    He gestures with his hand, up and down. "Well... who the hell would want to mess with you? And even if they do... then they gotta try to mess with me, too."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Yeah? How's that working out for everyone here?" Rachel turns a half circle, gesturing around herself. "You're a mess about she who shall not be named. Kitty's a mess about someone else dumping her. I don't even know what's actually fun for me," she snorts softly.

Finally, she drops onto the edge of the bed, ruffling at her hair in a motion all too similar to Nate's. "Maybe you're right. Maybe I just need to go out and get laid or something."

X-Man has posed:
    "I'm not a mess. And for every one of us that might be having woes, there's someone else who is happy. Besides, it's like they say... Better to have loved and lost, or something, right?" He says with a shrug of shoulders that are so broad, in contrast with the rest of his lithesome form. "But... It wasn't like I loved her. We were just getting to know each other. It didn't work out. It happens."

    He smirks when she makes that last comment, nodding his head as he returns to the bed and just falls back onto it, laying flat and staring up at the ceiling. "You and me both. Though I really wouldn't even begin to know how or where to look for that. It's not like there was a lot of chances to learn how to date where I'm from. I'm sure it's the same for you."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Right?" Rachel makes a face, falling back to echo his posture again. "It was basically hey, we're alive, let's work out those hormones. Club, I guess. But preferably not the one that Sam manages, because, awkward. Pretty sure pretty much anyone else I've met has been in the process of crushing Sentinels."

"Let me know if you find a place, though. And which nights you're not going to be there because again, awkward," she teases, looking over with a smirk. "It's weird enough trying to keep some things quiet here without having to see your mating rituals."

X-Man has posed:
    "I don't think I'd want to see the kind of place that Sam manages, anyway. Doesn't seem like it would be my kind of place," Nate says with a laugh, shrugging his shoulders on the mattress. "But why would that be awkward? I mean, any of it? Sam's place, or seeing me in a club? I wouldn't feel awkward about... well, any of that."

    He kind of tilts his head to the side, his eyes narrowing a bit, staring off into some vacant distance, as if pondering it all. Finally, he shakes his head. "I don't really think that the club scene is the best answer, anyway, to be honest with you. I mean, if you're going to get laid, it should at least be with someone you respect and who respects you, outside of it. Not just some rando you pick up at a club, right? I mean... That just seems risky. And like it could lead to potential drama. I dunno. I kinda think it might be better to just do it with someone you know. And then if it becomes more, it becomes more. If it doesn't, then there's no shame in just having sex."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Nope, I'm pretty sure rando at the club is the way to go." Rachel folds her hands over her stomach. "Because otherwise it has a tendency to turn into more for one person or the other." She grimaces, looking up at the ceiling. "I kind of let my everything get the better of me when I first got here and let people get a little closer than I should have," she admits. "Which is why Sam's place is awkward."

She turns her head to look over, sheepish. "I mean, there might have been a couple others. And it's sweet and I, but I am in //no// way equipped to be someone's girlfriend, Nate. So honestly, rando from the club, back to his place, get dressed and go before anyone falls asleep? That sounds like about all I can actually handle."

X-Man has posed:
    Nate listens, nodding attentively as she gives her reasons for her decision. In the end, all he can really do is shrug again. "Hey, to each their own, but honestly? I think that's a bad call, Rachel. Like a seriously bad call, and I worry you're just going to feel worse for it."

    He rolls over onto his side, facing her, propping his face in the palm of his hand, which is propped up by his elbow. Letting his gentle blue stare wash over her, his features soften once more, becoming a sad, sympathetic expression. "You're not really living, at that point, either. You might as well just be doing the mission. You're turning it into a mission, more or less. All business. Just a rote function. I don't care if you let people get too close before. You did it. You learned from it. You might have even learned the wrong things from it. It might not have been that you let people too close. It might have just been the people you let close."

    He pauses for a moment, lips twisting to one side as he frowns. "Look. I'm just saying that you don't need to be someone's girlfriend, but you're also still not allowing anything to touch you if you're planning on just going around screwing random people and then leaving all the time. You need to make human connection, Rachel. Our situations make it even more important for us than anyone, to make those connections. That's why I think it'd be best to maybe explore that kind of thing with someone you trust. But it doesn't have to jump right into relationship territory. I think that's where most people go wrong, in our circles. They think the first kiss means that they have to be exclusive, or that... well, that it's anything more than a kiss. Find someone you trust, implicitly. Someone who gets you. Someone who isn't going to want to jump right in to being like engaged to be married after the first date. But someone that might be open into growing that way, when and if, you both decide that it's the course you want to take. Or that will be cool veering off in another direction if it no longer fits."

    He leans forward, closer to her, so that his face hovers near her cheek. Quietly, with a teasing smile, he whispers, "Besides, the rumor mill around here is pretty persistent, you know. Everyone's heard about your former adventures. I don't know how much it would help your rep if you just started picking up people at the clubs."

Marvel Girl has posed:
Rachel groans, dropping her brow against his shoulder at the last. "You're an ass," she mutters, digging a knuckle into his side to make the point a little more clear. "You're right, but you're still an ass."

She tucks her other arm behind her head, ruffling at her hair once more. "Sounds like you're talking about what they now call a 'friend with benefits,'" she muses. "Which is not bad. I mean. It's not that different from what I used to do either," she points out. "Not like any of us expected a future. We were a little more worried about the now, and pretty sure one or the other of us would die before there was a future. Shockingly, we were usually right."

X-Man has posed:
    When she rests her head against his shoulder, he chuckles, and lifts his hand to ruffle his fingers through her perfectly red hair. But, her knuckle in his side makes his entire body recoil, his knees curling up instinctively from the pain, as he lets out a sudden "ow!" and grabbing her wrist, pushing it away.

    "I'm not an ass! I just happen to have a very nice one," He says, turning his face to look over his shoulder with a mock-appraising stare and nod of approval at his own leather clad rear. Looking back to her, Nate heaves with another sigh, and lets the somber nature of it settle back in. He nods quietly, as his eyes fall down, looking at the mattress in between them. He thinks about the very few women he had been intimate with, in his time. A rueful smile flits across his lips. Forced. Never quite reaching his eyes that suddenly look so weary.

    "Every single person I slept with back there died. Every one of them. But... that was just the way of things. Life was... it held no value. Everything was disposable. That was the design, after all. Survival of the fittest. It's very nature is meant to spur a cycle of death until nothing is left, really.... so I watched all of them die. But not me. Never me. I don't think I even can die."

    He needs to push aside the darkness, before it swallows them both. So, he puts on his best happy face, which is surprisingly good. He has one of those boyishly handsome faces with bright eyes that makes him seem like the human embodiment of a puppy dog, when he tries. And he's trying now. Smiling, he reaches over and pats her stomach with his palm,and says, "So there you go. You'll always have me, if nothing else, right? They can't take me from you. I'm too powerful and I'm immortal. Even if "they" take everything else from you, Rachel, you have me."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Says you." Rachel is quiet for a moment, wrestling with the whole feelings thing. With connection. Finally, she settles for reaching over to take his hand. "Hey, they couldn't kill me either," she murmurs. "And even if they had, I've got a feeling the Phoenix wouldn't have let it stick. Though I didn't think it would let Mom-" Nope, time to cut that thought off.

Closing her eyes tightly, she gives his hand a squeeze. "Nope, not going there. But." She lets her eyes open again as she looks over. "So hey. You and me left at the end of the world. //That's// gonna be the awkward part. What the hell are we going to talk about?"