xp_logs | Ororo and Remy - Saturday November 24th (Reply)

Feeling a little impulsive, Ororo flies down to New Orleans to surprise Remy with a visit. They end up going to the bayou to see Tante Mattie, and Ororo gets sized up by the voodoo priestess in a very weird 'Meet the Parents' way. Backdated.

It had really been too easy. Of course, it wasn't as if she had expected Remy to stay in a four-star hotel, but the small lodging house just outside the 9th ward hadn't even had electronic keycards for the doors. It had made gaining entrance to Remy's room simple, barely a minute needed with the lockpicks before the door swung open and she was admitted to the nondescript bedroom with en suite bathroom. True to form, there was barely a sign that anyone was even staying there, but Ororo knew it was the right place. The desk clerk had been quite helpful, and it wasn't as if there were many men matching Remy's description wandering about. The eyes are a dead giveaway...

Shutting and locking the door behind her, 'Ro decided to make herself comfortable. She didn't know how long it would be before Remy arrived, but she was ready to be patient.

Remy came through the front door quickly, nodding to Andre at the front desk. He found it easiest to stay anonymously in the city, in an area that the Guilds had no trusted eyes. Keeping up the Guild connection was important, especially with all of the new masters still settling into their positions. Remy paused at the door of his room, and fished for his keys. The door opened easily, and the charged card was already three quarters of the way to be thrown when he realised who was there.

"'ro?"

"Hello, mpenzi." The silver-haired woman rolled into a sitting position from where she had been lying on the bed, flashing a grin at Remy. "I would appreciate if you would not finish that thought... we both know from experience how difficult blood is to get out from hotel sheets."

Remy stopped, crumpling the card in his hand with a series of small pops from the energy. "Planning on Thieves Guild status, chere? Dey'd give it to you wit' out a trial run first, you know." He came forward and kissed her with a smile.

"Best surprise dat I've had in a long time."

"I am glad. Otherwise I wasted my frequent flyer miles." Ororo wound her arms around Remy's waist, smiling up at him. "I thought you might have grown a little lonely on your business trip. And..." Her expression flickered to something a bit more pensive for a moment. "I wanted to see the city again."

"How is it?" The question was simple enough, but layered with complexity. Here she'd lost her powers and nearly died to save the city. Despite reassurances, her powers hadn't shown a flicker of returning yet. Something in Remy bled with the thought of it.

"Different. Thankfully." Of course it was different, she had known it would be, and yet it was a relief to see the clear blue skies over the slow muddy river. "I could not avoid it forever. So here I am."

"Here you are. Remy actually came to get ready to drive out into de bayou, chere. Tante asked me by. But," His hand lingered against her shoulder. "We could afford to be a little late."

Her laugh was low and throaty. "If you are sure it will not cause her any annoyance... she does not seem a woman I would like to cross willingly."

His hand cupped her cheek. "Dere's some things dat Remy feels are worth de risk." He said, joining her on the bed.

***

The swamp was always warm and moist, even in the winter. Remy had been somewhat animated during the trip, pointing out the odd landmark, but once they'd entered the bayou, he'd gone quiet, focusing on the road. The path into the swamp seemed to twist and shift in front of her eyes, a confusing route that even Remy was having trouble navigating. Both of them felt relief as they finally reached the space in front of a small wooden shack, built high on a concrete block base. Smoke curled out the small chimney stack on the roof.

Despite the onset of winter, there was still something muggy about the air as they made their way out of the car and down the winding path towards the shack. Ororo looked about, at once impressed by the timeless appearance of the moss-coated trees that surrounded them. As if they have stood here forever.

Remy stood in front of the shack, as the door creaked open. He rolled his eyes at the sound. "Dere's no need for theatrics, Tante. We're not tourists." He muttered as they went up the steps and through the door. Past the exterior shabby age, the inside was a small but tightly constructed home. Tante stood at her kitchen, testing something from a pot on the wood stove, her back to them.

Something which, unless Ororo's nose deceived her, smelled very good indeed. It had been some time since she had eaten - airline food notwithstanding - and her stomach twisted itself about in its efforts to remind her of that fact.

"Jah a poor house guest, LeBeau. No food or drink t' offer." Tante's thick, brown voice seemed to eminate from all around the shack. It seemed almost an extension of her; the piles of handtwisted rugs, the bunches of herbs and dried meat hanging from the rafter beams, the most modern technology visible an old rotary phone and a battered portable radio. It was the Voodoo Queen's home, but it was also that of a woman long grown comfortable with herself and her needs. "If it wasn't for de femme jah brung, Tante tempted t' put jah out de door."

"He has come quite some way to see you - do not throw him out quite yet." Ororo knew the other woman was joking (or mostly, anyway) but couldn't help but speak up; after all, Remy had seemed almost excited to be going into the bayou, and she wanted Tante to know that. "His manners need refining but the thought is there."

"De thought? Jah thinking now, Remy? Dat's dangerous territory for jah." Tante said, earning another eyeroll from LeBeau.

"Been down to see de Guildmasters. Looks like thing's slowly returning to normal here."

"Possible. Dey get dere feet under dem and dere plots back out soon enough." Tante dipped a spoon into the pot and tasted the contents, pausing to add a handful of chopped vegetables. "Gon need to let dis boil longer. Jah get some wood for de stove."

It wasn't a request, and Remy shared a look with Ororo as he slipped out. He knew the old woman too well, not to recognize this as a why to get him out of the shack so Tante could talk to Ororo. He wasn't exactly sure her fascination with his girlfriend; if he didn't know her better, he'd almost think it was familial concern. But Tante's powers, and her facility with the future made the simple answer a difficult one to believe.

Though Ororo wasn't exactly afraid of the older woman, nor was she entirely at ease being left alone with her in her house. She knew from Remy and Amanda's stories just how formidable Tante could be, and she realized with a start that this was very much like meeting her boyfriend's parents, with a dash of voodoo precog thrown in for good measure. Not a reassuring thought, really.

"Sit, childe." Tante said as she settled herself into a wooden chair across from her. Tante Mattie was a big woman, tall and broad. She was obviously older, but had reached that curiously timeless state, her skin still mostly smooth and her hair a rich black. But there was something ancient in those eyes, and Remy had once said that she had to have been approaching eighty, even if she looked at least two decades younger. "Jah chosen ta take up wit' LeBeau. Dat's a choice dat many femme before jah made, to dere regret. What makes jah wan ta follow dat dance?"

Right into it, then. Well. Ororo could handle it. "Remy is an extraordinary man. And I think that no matter what happens between us in the future I will not regret it," she stated, folding her hands on the smooth wooden table. "Already he has impacted my life for the better. He is a difficult man to know, but not that difficult to care for."

Tante reached beside her, picking up a worn pack of cards and shuffling them, as she considered the woman. With a practiced hand, she spread the cards in front of her. "Jah don believe dis nonsense, do jah? Tante ken see it. See de hole in jah dat de rain no long fills and de storm no longer touches. How far down de path wit' him are jah, ta give up so much, neh?" She gestured at the cards, much like Marie-Ange used to. "Jah not 'fraid ta find out."

She wasn't afraid, no, but the way the other woman had cut through to the heart of the matter in a few simple words was enough to give Ororo pause. She hesitated, then reached out to tap a card, meeting Tante Mattie's eyes as the card was turned over. It wasn't a deck that Ororo was familiar with, yet as her gaze flicked downward she recognized the card almost immediately - the Empress. The woman on the card had darker features than was usual in a tarot deck, though she looked as regal and stately as ever. Much like the woman that sits before me now, the silver-haired woman realized.

"Jah enjoy de power sometime, don jah? De beauty dat he finds, de desire and de sex? Jah captured de beast inside him wit' a silver chain, and jah excited by de fact dat one day, he might just break loose." Her words weren't cruel, but cut all the same. She shuffled the card to the centre, and turned over Ororo's next card with a vicious smile; the Tower. "Transformation; de humbling of ego, a fall. Jah feel fallen yet, childe? Losing jah powers, taking up wit' dat one; dat is a fall in de eyes of others, Tante bet." She said, needlingly her.

"I have long since learned not to let what others think inform my opinion of myself," Ororo replied, a little stiffly. "Those that would think less of me for those happenings are not people whose opinions matter." This was obvious, and yet she found as she was saying it doubts began to creep in, shaking the already-fragile foundation of her self-confidence.

The next card was turned. The Five of Cups. Loss, and sorrow.

"Dat's jah future coming for jah, childe. Pain, regret; dere's gon be things taken way dat jah weep ta lose, on dis road jah choosing." Tante gave a shake of her head. "Why jah choose de path dat leads jah ta all dis pain, childe? Dere's a future wit'out dat too, wrapped up in de prettiest words jah can find. Easy, dat easy. Easy as jah want it ta be. Or is dat really jah choice being made? Let's find out de reason, neh?"

Tante gestured at the cards again.

Ororo hesitated again, inwardly berating herself for letting the old woman continue to throw her off-balance. She had expected to be judged, of course, but it seemed like the voodoo priestess had moved beyond judging to the sentencing.

She turned The Hermit next, frowning a bit at the solitary old man, his lantern held against the encroaching darkness.

"Solitude. Wit'drawl." Tante's skin seemed darker, deeper in the lights of the shack. "A future alone ta consider all dat jah 'bout ta go through. Dere's a dark road stretching out front of jah; one dat de Baron dance 'long wit' smile on his face, childe. At de end, jah de only one left, forgetton and isolated."

Tante placed the last card down in front of Ororo, the cardboard back taunting, seemingly daring her to learn her true fate. Tante's expression was unreadable, her face carved from dark wood, immobile and still.

Enough was enough. While Ororo couldn't deny the truth in the old woman's reading, neither was she content to sit there while the contents of her life and mind were spread out over the table to be scrutinized. Once again meeting Tante's eyes, she reached out and covered the card with one hand, slipping it from the table and into her pocket without a glance. "No road leads only in one direction; and the future is never set in stone," she said, her voice regaining a bit of strength. "Whatever the cards may say, it is still up to me to make my own future."

As she stared into the other woman's dark eyes and waited for her reaction, Ororo had the feeling of deja vu - as if she was standing in front of another hurricane, just waiting for it to hit.

Tante leaned back in her chair, her head nodding slowly. "Possible." She said finally, her mouth widening into a white grin before she got up and walked over to the pot. The door banged open with a combination of wind, rain and Remy's foot, as he staggered in with an armload of wood. His auburn hair was plastered to his forehead, and water dripping down his face.

"Remy got de firewood in de rain dat Remy sure dat you knew 'bout, Tante."

"Course. Don 'pect Tante to go out in dat, at my age. Sit down 'for jah drip all over Tante's floor." She ladled three bowls full and placed them steaming on the table. With one hand, she swept the cards into a pile and put them back into her apron pocket.

***

And so it had gone. No mention had been made of the cards or the reading again, nor had either woman let on what had passed between them to Remy, though they both noticed his curious glances between them. Later, when Ororo and the Cajun had returned to the motel they had shared a more leisurely lovemaking, exchanging in murmurs observations about their visit with Tante and the stories that had been shared over the broad kitchen table. Their rain-touched clothing was strewn about the room haphazardly, and in the mess something had fallen from the pocket of Ororo's trousers to lie under the bed. It was the final card she had taken but not seen, the crease down the middle bisecting the dark-skinned woman that floated above the globe - The World.