callisto + farouk

[x-callisto.livejournal.com]

Amahl Farouk thinks Callisto might want to talk about the Morlocks. Callisto really thinks not.



Today Callisto was replacing every dud bulb in the mansion. She was quite sure there were people with telekinesis, or stretchy arms, or super-tallness, or the ability to regenerate electrical filament or something who would do it way faster. But that wouldn't serve the purpose of using up her time and besides, once she got into the rhythm of it it was quite therapeutic really. Enter room - meeting room, office, classroom, whatever - try every light in succession, replace duds from big box o' bulbs (tm), lather, rinse, repeat.

Of course, it wasn't all plain sailing. The mansion had high ceilings and using a ladder seemed like cheating somehow. Currently she was upside down... -ish, a ceiling beam gripped between her knees, fresh bulb between her teeth, unscrewing a particularly reluctant dud from a rather good mock-chandelier in what she assumed to be a meeting room of some kind. The Mission Impossible approach to DIY.

The sounds of a student body embracing the summer vacation thrummed through the campus. It had a very specific timbre, Amahl thought, squinting in slight irritation. Components of an overenthusiastic riot-mob and a rabid herd of lemmings were certainly present. And, of course, the exact area of quad that bordered his apartment was chosen by vast majority of the students as the preferred meeting place driving him out in search of a quiet refuge.

Gripping his pad and the book in one hand, Farouk opened the door to the auditorium and froze in mild shock as his eyes met those of a girl hanging upside down from the rafters.

Perhaps students these days WERE under more pressure than in his time....

Callisto started at the sound of a door opening, releasing her grip on the chandelier to hang freely, twisting to see who had entered. As she caught the professor's gaze she raised her eyebrows - a curious expression when one is upside down - and retrieved the lightbulb from her mouth, absentmindedly pocketing it before its sharp descent reminded her that her pocket was, of course, upside down also, and she was forced to pluck it from the air before it fell onto the large mahogany table beneath her. Now was not a time to test the theory that light bubs always landed on their metal end.

"Sorry," she said in a voice that sounded as though it was never sorry about anything. "Do you need this room? I can go..."

"No, no!" Farouk raised his hands preemptively. "Please don't let me interrupt."

He had made it a point of staying on excellent terms with the mansion's maintenance staff, on the principle that somebody like Dayspring was a mouthy Neanderthal with an over-inflated ego, but a pissed off janitor could truly make Amahl's life a living hell.

Plus they always knew more than everybody else.

His head tilted as he observed the girl's acrobatics with a slightly horrified fascination. "That's a truly intense dedication to you job, you have there.... Uhm? I'm sorry I don't believe we've met..."

Callisto rolled her eyes, releasing her grip on the beam to plummet floorwards, taking a single handspring off the table to land on her feet before the older man. "Callisto," she said simply, offering a hand on autopilot. This was the kind of guy you were supposed to shake hands with when you met. She could tell.

"Please call me Amahl," Farouk grasped the hand firmly. As Callisto's face moved from the shadows of the room something about tickled his mind. It was distinctive, surely memorable enough - but somehow he could not get a fix on why it seemed familiar, even as he somehow felt that it was important he remember.

He realized suddenly that he had held the handshake a little too long and stepped back, smiling apologetically. "Sorry. Mind must be playing tricks on me - you seemed familiar there, for a second."

Callisto raised just one eyebrow this time, surveying the man a little doubtfully. "I really think I'd remember if we'd met."

Farouk smoothed out his mustache, and sketched out a slightly exaggerated bow, spoiled a little by the fact that he almost lost grip on his book. "Why thank you, Ms. Callisto. I like to think that I cut a striking and memorable figure."

"Just Callisto, thanks," the slim young woman answered, sticking both hands in her pockets, the bulb somewhat safer now that she was in an upright position. "And yes, I think it's safe to call you memorable."

An errant lock of dark hair slipped stubbornly from behind the girl's ear and fell across her eye, hiding the scar for a split second - which proved just long enough for Farouk's memory to spark. His eyes widened minutely, the warmth leeched out by the memory of the file he had glimpsed almost a decade ago and the bloody horror of the dreams' end it contained. "My God... Of course! The Morlocks!"

Callisto suppressed a wince, scowling. What the fuck is it with these people and the fucking Morlocks? No one paid the slightest heed to us when we were actually around... "Right," she said, sounding thoroughly unenthused. "The Morlocks."

Farouk cursed behind the immediately remorseful mien. Of course the girl would be reluctant to talk about the massacre, but dammit... Careful. This would take careful handling.

"Not a pleasant topic for you, of course." He spread his arms apologetically. "I understand."

"I highly doubt that." Callisto's shoulders hunched a little, her expression remaining sullen.

"You'd be surprised." Farouk's crooked grin did not reach his eyes. "I grew up in Lebanon, in the eighties." He shrugged and shook his head. "But regardless - I am sure you have been psychoanalyzed and prodded and forced to achieve closure, long since. I have to admit, personally I am a big believer in repression. So it wasn't my intention to bring back the memories or to play 'who had the best massacre.' I'm sorry. Honest. It just took me by surprise. I have been thinking about your experiment for years."

"...'Experiment'?"

Farouk squinted. "My exceptionally keen intellect suggests to me that I have yet again inserted my foot firmly into my oral cavity."

Shifting his pad, he fished out a pen. "Listen. This will sound callous and insensitive, but what happened to you and your people was not simply a personal tragedy. Although obviously that. It was also one of the first attempts to create an unapologetically autonomous mutant commune. I'm not.." he scribbled his address and phone on the page and tore it out. " ...going to pile you with rhetoric. You look intelligent enough not to buy into the cliché that you need to do anything to make that event mean something. But, of you decide you can or want talk about it with me, I would appreciate it."

Farouk offered the folded page to Callisto. "I think, in many ways, it was a socio-political event far ahead of its time. But defining of mutants' future as a people nonetheless. Please think about it."

Callisto stared at the paper, her lips curling with distaste, although it didn't take a genius or an empath to see genuine pain behind it. "The Morlocks were thrown together by misfortune and lack of anywhere else to go. It was a mutant cardboard city, not a commune." She shuffled a tiny step back from the proffered note. "And I don't want to talk about it."

Farouk sighed. "Fair enough." He placed the note on the nearest chair. "Well, you were here first so It's only just that I find my own perch. I do wish you think on the idea that it's a very thin line that separates global mutancy from being in the same position as your Morlocks on a vastly larger scale."

He shrugged. "We all hope that Charles' dream of the future will prove true. But I tend to prepare for the worst. Perhaps learning from the past would help us avoid walking blindly into the same bloody mistakes."

He inclined his head in a farewell and turned around, reaching for the door-handle. "And again - I do apologize for bringing back the memories." Walking out he closed the door gently behind him.

Callisto only realised then she was gritting her teeth so hard she'd bitten halfway through her tongue. Turning away from the door resolutely (even though there was no longer anyone there to see the gesture), she took a leap and, using the mahogany table as a spring point, once more grabbed hold of the rafter. As she swung upside down the forgotten bulb fell from her pocket, bouncing on the hardwood floor with a loud metallic clang that rang for several seconds in the quiet room.

Guess that answers that one.