Amanda & Laurie: New York, New York

[x-wallflower-.livejournal.com]

Who: Laurie Collins, Amanda Sefton
When: Saturday 30th September 2006 Time: 8:00am



Laurie slid into one of the front seats on the bus, putting her bag down in front of her. She hadn't been on one of the New York trips before, so she wasn't sure exactly what to expect. She'd been to New York before with her mother, but this was different. She looked over at Amanda. "Um, Miss Sefton?"

Amanda was in the process of digging out her faithful clipboard so she could note down who she had this week - part of the security precautions. At the sound of Laurie's voice, she looked up, grimacing a little at the title. "Amanda, please. 'Miss Sefton' makes me sound like some character from a Dickens story," she said with an amused smile. "What's up... Laurie, isn't it?"

Laurie blushed and nodded. "A-Amanda then. Um, I've never been on one of these before. What do we do once we get to New York?"

Well, she could be doing better here. Least she'd only stuttered over the first letter though. One of these days, she was going to become a great doctor and cure stuttering forever. Right after she became President of the United States but just before she became the first astronaut to land on Mars... girl had to have dreams, afterall.

"Whatever you like, 's long as it's a) not going to need me to bail you out, b) not going to get you or anyone else hurt or c) involve you not coming back by five so I have to send some seriously scary men out to find you," Amanda replied, ticking off points on her fingers. At Laurie's confused expression, she relented. "Most of the kids get into small groups, go hang out, shop, maybe watch a movie. That sort of thing. The whole idea is to have a bit of a break, regain your sanity from the madhouse, y'know?"

"Well, I don't think you have to worry about me and bail. I've had enough of jails to last me about seven lifetimes. " Laurie replied, smiling wryly.

Small groups she could do. Depending on who else was on the bus, she could probably just join up with one of the kids she knew. If not, she supposed she could hunt down a map and spend her time hanging out in museums.

"So, what do you do while we're all running amok in your city? Or carefully structured as to not cause jail time amok anyhow."

"Depends. Sometimes Amara and I hang out, do the 'welcome to the big bloody city' thing," Amanda replied, twisting in her seat so she could face Laurie a bit better. "Or I have lunch with some of the others - when they don't mind this old fogey hanging around." She winked as she said it - at nineteen, she wasn't much older than most of her charges. "Or if no-one needs me, I go back to the office for a bit and get some work done."

"Oh. Um, cool. Do you think I, um..Well, I've only ever been to New York with my mother before and that was for business and um, I...Do you mind if I hang out with you? Just for a little bit. I won't be any trouble." Laurie replied, slowly at first and then in a rush to get it out before blushing again and pushing at her bag with her feet.

It might have been easier just to wait to see who else was on the trip and go with them but if you never tried to talk to new people, you never got to know anyone.

Amanda raised her eyebrow slightly, but smiled and nodded. "Yeah, of course you can." This had been part of the point of doing this, after all - give the kids a break from the school, give herself a chance to get to know them, if only so she might be able to help more if something happened to any of them... Pushing aside that thought, she regarded the obviously-nervous girl. "So, what sort of stuff do you like to do? You one of the shop til you drop types, or you more into museums and the like?"

"Museums. Although, I like shopping. Just, well, I hate shops. All those people and they glare at you when you so much as slow down and yuck." Laurie replied, smiling thankfully. "Although, I guess New York isn't exactly the place you go for quiet slow-town living. It's just that I hate when they expect you to be just as much in a rush and in a bad mood as they are."

Amanda chuckled. "Yeah, I gotta tell you, I'd much rather face down a demon invasion than go shopping in some of the swanky areas - talk about sorry for breathing. Some of the cows in those places are so uptight their faces'd crack if they tried to smile."

Laurie grinned. "They probably are demons. I mean, couldn't you imagine them with little horns and a pitchfork, ready to make judgement on how 'in season' your clothing is. Although, I'm not entirely sure what bad fashion hell would look like."

Laurie relaxed a little, taking her hands off her knees where she'd had them in a death grip a moment before and unconsciously tugging at the air-scrubber around her neck. She needed to talk to Paige about that soon, see if she was safe to take it off entirely.

"Probably a lot like the places my mate Angie drags me to for work gear," Amanda replied with a snort. Glancing around, she did a quick headcount. "Everyone on that's coming?" she called out, to a chorus of yeses (and some noes). "Here," she said, passing Laurie the clipboard. "Can you write down everyone's names down on that for me? We're running a bit late and I want to get going so I don't get caught in traffic. This beast is a bastard for that."

"Sure, I can do that." Laurie replied, taking the clipboard and turning around to face the other kids as she felt the bus start to move. She quickly ticked off all the names of the people she knew, and called out the ones of those she hadn't had a chance to meet yet. Even though the mansion didn't have a large population of students like some schools, it was still possible not to know everyone. Especially for someone like Laurie, who was good at faces but absolutely horrible at remembering people's names.

Once she was done, she turned back around and placed the clipboard beside her on the seat. She'd hand it back to Amanda later, after they'd gotten to their destination.

"You used to go to the school, right?" Laurie asked, trying to remember back to everything she'd learnt in her first few days at the school.

Pausing to check for traffic before pulling out of the front gate, Amanda nodded. "For a bit, yeah. Left almost a year ago now and ended up working at Snow Valley." She hoped Laurie wouldn't ask her the circumstances. 'I became apprentice to a psychic vampire witch' was something of a conversation-killer. "How're you finding the place? Getting on all right?"

"I'm doing okay. Everyone's really nice and no one freaked out because I could make them cry just because I was feeling down." Laurie replied, fingering the scrubber again. She wanted it off so badly. It was a symbol really, of how different she was, how little control she had of where her life was going. Little by little she was being able to turn it off for longer without anyone being affected and now with what Forge said.

"Is all that stuff they talk about real? You know, the demon invasions and stuff. I mean, you'd have been here for all that stuff, right?"

Amanda coughed a little. "Um, yeah, I was. " She glanced over at Laurie with an embarrassed look. "Was actually responsible for one of them. Tho' it was just the one demon."

"No, seriously...." Laurie replied, waiting for Amanda to break into a grin and reach over to slap her on the shoulder like she'd just been a part of some huge joke. "Um, okay, you are serious. Demons are really real? Like, horns and big evil laughs and wanting to eat your liver and everything?"

Laurie's hands moved back to her knees, eyes widening as she realised the implications of that. Demons, real live icky demons had been in her school, breaking funiture, probably smoking without permission. Well, she supposed if you were a demon you couldn't help but smoke...She wondered if maybe she was going into just a little bit of shock here.

"There's a lot out there that's real that you didn't think was. Demons, Asgard, magic... The good thing at least is most of it's safely tucked away in other dimensions. 'S not likely any of you lot will ever see a demon up close and personal." Amanda tried to be reassuring and didn't add 'except if Illyana's got PMS or something'. "The school's got some pretty decent protection wards on it - my old teacher put 'em on before he took off for foreign places."

Laurie nodded, going on nodding just a little longer then was probably normal before she got herself firmly under control. If mutants who could create an entire tsunami didn't shock her, why should magic and demons and, wait, did that mean God existed as well? God, singular rather then plural since she'd heard from the stories of Asgard that the Norse gods seemed to be more then real and being all diety like in a foreign dimension.

"So, anyone met God yet?"

Barking out a laugh, Amanda shook her head. "Not as far as I know, no. Not even Kurt, and he's the closest thing we have to a saint. Jury's out on the big bloke upstairs. And on Him Downstairs as well - demons... well, they're not the things you get in the Bible. More like creatures from another dimension that are a lot more relaxed on the rules of behaviour than we are."

"It's not as scary as I thought it would be, you know. Being a mutant and all. And everyone treats everything like it's just another day on the job. Sometimes I think there's not much that could go wrong that someone couldn't find a way out." Laurie replied, smiling.

And it did feel that way, living at the mansion. Scary and shocking as it could be to have the thoughts of sixteen years turned on their head from time to time, she'd always felt safe.

"For the most part, you're right. I mean, there's precautions, like having your phone with you all the time and using the panic button if you even think you've got trouble... but there's not much the leather brigade can't handle. And what they can't, well, there's others out there." The kids didn't know the true nature of Snow Valley, and they were careful not to announce it these days, but Amanda felt a little bit of pride in the knowledge that she was one of those resources these days.

Sure it was about the job, but sometimes t helped to know that the job included keeping kids like Laurie safe. These trips... they reminded Amanda of what she was working for.

Laurie nodded, looking out the window at the trees and cars parked neatly beside houses. It was a beautiful day to be going to New York. Maybe she could convince Amanda to grab some lunch in Central Park while they were there. "Do you ever hate them? Non-mutants, I mean."

It was a bit of a segue, but talking of danger and trouble, it almost seemed natural to talk about this as well. It wasn't even that she herself hated non-mutants. Her mother was a non-mutant afterall, as were some at the mansion. But sometimes, like with the cops, she wondered if people like her Mom weren't in a minority and a slowly shrinking one at that.

"Never." Amanda's tone was decisive. "Sure I've had my dose of shite from bigots - I think we've all had it, in some form or other - but I just remind myself that the pillocks aren't the majority, not by half." Her voice turned a little wistful. "For a while there I lost my powers, was just like everyone else. Was one of the best things to ever happen to me, living like normal people. I miss it, sometimes." She shrugged a little. "Then again, there's parts of my powers that make me glad they come back. Swings and roundabouts, really."

"I don't have anything useful I can do with mine yet." Laurie responded, thinking about Amanda's answer. "But the teachers think I should be able to learn to control it enough that I might find something useful for it. I took Biology this year so I could understand it better."

It was nice to just talk, she'd been getting a bit caught up in her routine lately and not really seeking out people to be social with. She'd forgotten how good it felt just to chat.

"You'd be surprised what you can do when you think laterally," Amanda told her. All the while trying to remember what Laurie's powers were. "Um, pheromones, right?"

"Yeah. It's Pheromone-induced hormone manipulation. At least, that's what the Doc says, I don't really understand it much yet beyond the fact that when I'm sad, people cry, only they don't actually feel sad. Sort of weird."

Both eyebrows went up that time. "It's one of the more unusual ones, yeah," Amanda agreed. "But then again, you've got that girl who can manipulate her hair, so there's varying levels of 'weird' going on. Still, once you learn to control it... well, I can think a couple of things that you'd be really good at. Medicine, for one. Or disaster relief - you could use your power to calm people down, get them to co-operate, that sort of thing."

Laurie thought of that, getting to help people with something that up till now had been more of a pain in the arse then anything special. She liked that idea, she really did. "That could be cool. I mean, people being all calm, would have to stop a lot of them getting more hurt, right?"

"Exactly. Something like the quake in San Diego..." And here she glanced in the rear vision mirror to make sure Julio was out of earshot. "...With the clean-up from that, there were all sorts of ways someone with your powers could have helped. Calming people down in the shelters so they could be helped efficiently, encouraging the rescue crews with a boost of adrenaline, that sort of thing. If you're interested in learning more about that stuff, you could always join up with Red X. I think they're starting up the program again - I could find out for you, get you some information?"

"Would you? That'd be fantastic. Although, first I have to learn to control them so I can use them without it being 'I feel like this, so you react like this.' But with the powers classes, I'm hoping I'll be a bit further along soon." Laurie replied, suddenly feeling excited.

She could help people, she really could. It was the best news she'd heard all week.

"No worries. Information's what I do - 'm a research assistant for Wanda at Snow Valley. And I know how it is, wanting to figure out ways to make what you've got benefit people. 'S a gift, so why not use it to help people, yeah?"

Amanda was pleased to see the sudden animation - Laurie was one of the quiet ones, sometimes a little too quiet. Red X would not only give her a chance to expand her horizons, it might her a chance to meet people too.

"As far as powers control goes... you can still get involved even without being able to use them yet. There's a lot a trained pair of hands can do, and they give you the training. I didn't have my powers at San Diego, but I still did my bit."

"Was it scary? I was watching it on the news and it looked scary." Laurie replied, looking over her shoulder to where Julio was sitting aways away. She knew he felt bad about San Diego, and a part of her wished she could fix that. But she knew that you couldn't fix feelings from the outside, they just had to go in their own time. This wanting to be nice to him had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he was also a hottie. Least, that's what she told herself, anyhow.

Amanda smiled to herself a little at the glance at Julio. Ah, young love. Or at least, young raging hormones. "It was a bit, yeah. But you learn to just push that sort of thing away, concentrate on the job at hand. Plenty of time for the wiggins later, when you've got people around who can help." They were on the freeway by now, and Amanda relaxed a bit, leaning her elbow on the small window ledge next to her. "That's the important thing, mind. Remembering there are people around you who can help."

"I think it's the hardest thing to do, remembering that. Especially when you've gone through all your life, not having to deal with crisis and things blowing up around you. Or just turning all around till you can't recognise a thing. You've got to stop paniccing long enough to recognise the hand to help you up." Laurie replied, realising that once she'd learned how to use her powers properly, that's probably where she'd come in. Getting people calm enough to recognise that help was there.

"Something like that, yeah." Amanda was quiet for a while, thinking of herself last year, of Marius and Jennie. Of how things had well and truly turned all around for them. Hopefully Marius would see the choices, as she had eventually. "Any way, enough of the serious stuff... what sort of music do you like?"