Lorna and Marie on ice!

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Marie drags Lorna away from the mansion for some good old fashioned winter fun.

Marie glanced over at the green haired woman sitting next to her, heat blasting to warm up the Beetle. "Y'know, the thing Ah miss most about the South are the winters. Ah don't know why Ah originally thought Northern winters would be so grand. A wondrous white winterland stretching out with snow covered roofs and snowmen dotting the landscape." She made at face at the piles of snow they were passing. "No one ever tells you that it gets all brown and gross when it sticks around for weeks and gets mixed with salt and dirt."

"It doesn't snow at all where I'm from. Did you know it's 75 degrees in the Valley? Practically beach weather." Lorna still, after four years, seemed to regard the winter as a personal affront to her sensibilities, like someone had designed it just to annoy her. There was a scarf wound round her neck and up over her mouth; all her words were slightly muffled. Between her lack of body fat and her scars, she had a hard time regulating her core temperature. "I could be working on my tan right now."

"Why did ya ever leave?" Marie said. "And Ah know where we're going on our next vacation then. Sunny beaches, drinks with umbrellas in them, the whole nine yards." Maneuvering the car into a small lot, Marie parked carefully and then adjusted her gloves. "Still Ah'd miss some of the snow stuff. Like ice skating."

"I was stupid enough to think that I needed to learn powers control here. Now I'm just bound here by arcane arts." Lorna frowned out the window at the weather. "You're really going to make me do this? We can't skip it and go straight to the hot chocolate part?"

Rogue just grinned. "You have to fall on your backside a few times before you earn the hot chocolate. Otherwise it doesn't taste as good." Opening her door, she slid out of the car, boots crunching the icy snowy. "And you can't be that bad. It's just a bit of balance and coordination."

"You realize that I have neither, right? I'm from California, the only blades I should be on are rollerblades." Lorna groused as she opened the door and stepped out into the cold day. She eyed Marie suspiciously, "At least you're not going to attempt to use my inevitable shame to try to hook me up with someone, right? Because a) that never works and b) I told you to stop that."

"Ice skating isn't all that different from roller blading," Marie said, her breath fogging the air. "And why would you even imply that Ah would do a thing like that?" she asked in a mock offended tone. "Ah did that once. One time! And Ah swore Ah'd never do it again or you'd get to set me up, so you know Ah'll hold to my word."

"Which is what you say every time and then somehow conveniently you vanish and single men appear. It's like magic." Lorna stamped her feet, cheeks pink from the cold. She tugged her hat down over her head, "I don't buy your excuses, missy. You're a schemer."

Marie shrugged. "Not my fault. You're a pretty girl so guys hone in when they see ya alone. Ah don't hafta do anything for that to happen." She really never did anything to purposely set Lorna up - she was just good at making herself scarce when they were out and she noticed that a cute guy was eyeing her friend.

You'd have thought the palpable frost off her cold shoulder would have keep guys away but maybe it didn't work in winter. "Whatever. You're not leaving my side today. If I go down, you go down with me."

Marie rolled her eyes. "If that'll make you happy, fine." She paused as they reached the little outdoors stand, each telling the woman the size skates they needed and moving to a bench to put them on. "There are easier ways to keep the pleasure of my company than threats y'know," she added with a wink.

"True but I don't want you to start thinking I like you or something. You're strictly a bodyguard." Lorna poked Marie in the side through layers of clothing before bending to try to sort out the laces on the rented skates. It was impossible with gloves on and her fingers started to ache without them on. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Story of Lorna's entire life.

Marie laughed, working to adjust her own laces as well. "Well that's a relief. Ah'm good as a bodyguard. Not so good as a date." Standing up, she floated slightly over the ground and waited for Lorna to finish putting her skates on.

Lorna watched Marie hover for a moment and shook her head, laughing at herself, "Now why didn't I think of that?" She finished knotting her laces and stood carefully, trying to get used to the extra height and the thin edge of balance. "Okay, let's go."

"'cuz Ah'm the brains of this operation," Marie teased, floating towards the frozen pond. Setting down on the frozen surface, she began skating forward slowly. "And yeah, shouldn't you be able to keep yourself from falling?"

"Shush, you. The last time I was insane enough to strap razors to my feet...oh, wait, I've never been that crazy. I just didn't think of it. It's not like I ever use that particular aspect of my powers outside of missions and training." Lorna stepped gingerly onto the ice and almost immediately slipped, steadying herself with a hasty grab at the EM fields around her.

"Steady," Marie said, using her own abilities to keep her motions on the ice smooth. "Just pretend they're rollerblades. Balance and push forward and rebalance."

"Ice skating is nothing like rollerblading. Have you ever even tried rollerblading?" Lorna pushed off very carefully, keeping her balance more through judicious power use than her own internal grace. "Why did I let you talk me into this?"

"Ah'd say because Ah'm cute, but we've already established you don't swing that way. Which is good, because neither do Ah." Marie kept moving forward, keeping an eye on Lorna. "So Ah'd guess it's 'cuz you know Ah make you have fun."

"I've survived for 23 years without your crazy notions of fun," Lorna said petulantly, though truth be told she wasn't doing too terribly. Not nearly as well as Marie of course who was, Lorna swore, showing off by being all stable and not about to fall down.

"Survived, yes," Marie said, "But just plain ol' surviving isn't fun, now is it?" She could never understand why she could push people to do the same things she avoided herself, but she wasn't too concerned about it. "Admit it, you'd be sad if Ah stopped dragging you out."

Lorna stuck her tongue out at the other woman, "Would not. My life would be nice and quiet and boring and I wouldn't end up in other states without the faintest idea how I got there."

"Hey, Ah blame that one on you. That'd never happened to me before Ah started hangin' out with you. And as Ah recall, you initiated that particular evening," Marie teased, carefully turning so that she was facing Lorna and skating backwards.

"Show-off," Lorna mock-accused. "I had very good reason to initiate that evening. And yet, I never planned to end up most of the way to Canada. So I have to blame it on you. I don't even like Canada."

Marie grinned. "Don't worry, Ah'm sure Ah'll crash inta something since Ah'm showboating." She glanced over her shoulder to try and avoid said situation before turning her attention back to Lorna. "An' Ah don't think anyone ever plans on ending up halfway to Canada. It's like Tibet. It just happens."

"You're just saying that to try to get out of responsibility for it." Lorna nodded solemnly then pointed behind Marie, "Hockey wanna-be, 3 o'clock and incoming."

Marie quickly spun around, neatly avoiding crashing into the overzealous Wayne Gretzky wannabe. "Thanks for the warning," she said as she shifted to skate beside Lorna. "Two more laps and we can take a hot cocoa break if you'd like."

"Slave driver. Some day I will rise up against your reign of tyranny and oppression." Lorna hooked her arm through Marie's and let Marie's momentum drag her along.

Marie didn't react physically to Lorna's contact, though her internal anxiety heightened slightly. "Ah look forward to that day. Then it'll be your turn to drag me somewhere an' Ah can moan and groan about it," she kidded, adding a bit of speed to her pace.

"Maybe I'll take you surfing," Lorna cackled evilly. "And watch you wipe out again and again and again."

"Aw," Marie said as they finished another lap. "Ah make you do things wishing you'll succeed. Plus," she continued, pushing her speed up again, "Ah bet Ah could get the hang of it. How hard can it be?"

Lorna glanced at Marie and just laughed harder, even when she lost her balance and nearly slipped to her knees. "Sure you will. You'll be great, I'm sure."

Marie kept pulling Lorna even while she almost landed on her knees, casting a suspicious look at the other girl. As crossed their starting point again, she slowed down and let go. "See? Was that really so bad?"

"Hockey player again," Lorna responded dryly and yanked them both backward to get out of the speed demon's way.

Marie was caught off guard and in her attempt to over correct ended up knocking Lorna over and falling towards the ice. Catching herself, she stared at the hard surface she was floating above and slowly pushed herself back up. "Oops. See what happens when you avoid answering my question?"

Lorna hadn't been quite quick enough to catch herself before she hit the ice and she glared a bit at Marie's second nature command of flight. "Oh sure, blame me. You didn't even end up on the ground. Now you really really owe me hot chocolate." She got back to her feet slowly. "It wasn't terrible," she conceded after a moment.

"Ah'll take what Ah can get," Marie said with a grin.