callisto + wanda | afternoon into nighttime

[x-callisto.livejournal.com]

Wanda and Callisto meet, and... hang out, surprisingly enough. Callisto relaxes for once. Maybe due to the alcohol.






Wanda took the turn into Xavier's tightly, probably a bit too fast to be safe but she straightened the motorcycle with a grin and gunned the engine, heading towards the garage. She was hoping to see how Forge was faring and a few of the others, considering the last few weeks the X-Men had been having but until then, she was enjoying the feel of the machine under her and the ride. It had been a good ride there, no police which meant she certainly got to the mansion much faster than normal.

The garage was occupied, however, not by Forge, but by Callisto, who was making herself useful under the hood of one of the communal jeeps. She lifted her head as she heard a motorcycle approaching the building, pursing her lips thoughtfully as she scanned the area for which ones were currently out. As the figure on the bike roared into the garage she raised her eyebrows in surprise and approval, turning to lean back against the vehicle she'd been working on. Niiice...

She eased the bike into a gentle stop before reaching up to take off the helmet. Wanda had noticed Callisto but she paused to shake out her hair before shooting the other woman a grin. "Afternoon," she said, turning the motorcycle off before she gave into a quick stretch. "I do not think we've met - I'm Wanda Maximoff."

Oh Hello... A slow, easy smile spread across Callisto's face and she pushed away from the Jeep, strolling over to offer her hand to the other woman in greeting. "Callisto," she said.

Reaching over the bars of the bike, Wanda grasped the offered hand in a firm handshake. "Pleasure," she said, taking in the easy confidence the other woman had with walking around in the garage and the opened hood of the car. "I take it Xavier's has decided it needed another grease monkey?"

Callisto's smile twitched slightly smirk-ward. "Something like that," she said, her eyes sliding to the bike (admittedly subtly via a portion of Wanda's figure). "Nice bike," she said then. "Was wondering who this belonged to."

At that, Wanda gave the machine a loving pat as she swung herself off of it. "I'm glad to say this is my baby," she responded and then shot a wry look towards the cars around them. "A good thing, that, considering that my driving ability sends my coworkers running for the hills. You have probably seen it around - I might work in New York but I still come by to say hello to my friends and train with Jennie."

"Yeah, I've seen it around. Haven't seen you before, though," Callisto said, sticking her hands in her pockets and circling the bike, examining it anew now that she knew who owned it.

Wanda stood back with an amused but clearly understanding look on her face - she didn't know much about cars but Wanda knew about bikes. "Being a nearly six foot giant means I have to work on my ninja skills," she deadpanned before breaking it up with a sly wink. "Or so my bosses at Snow Valley say, anyway."

"Nothing wrong with being tall, quite the reverse," Callisto murmured absently. "Jennie?"

"Jennie Stavros. Our powers are similar enough that I have been able to help her refine her control." She gave a quick, proud smile. "Though that was not the original reason I ended up darkening Xavier's doorstep but a preferable one, I must admit." She nodded towards the machines around them. "Natural inclination or mutant power related?"

"Huh? Oh, the mechanic-work..." Callisto chuckled, shaking her head. "Well, I'm no Forge, if that's what you mean. I've got pretty acute hearing, I'm good with my hands... and I've worked around engines a lot. So I guess it's a combination of both."

At that, Wanda grinned. "It is safe to say that there is no one quite like Forge. My powers could lend themselves to this but, to be honest, I rather get my hands dirty in some other fashion." She smirked for a second as she unzipped the leather jacket she'd decided to wear against the wind and potential spills on the ride there. "Be it dusty books, ancient ruins or others but my powers are handy when I see that something is about to break on my bike. Then I bring it here."

"That'll be a refreshing change," Callisto said with a roll of her eyes, rounding the bike to stand once more in front of Wanda. "Most everyone around here does their own maintenance and I get the company cars, as it were. Which, honestly, there's only so much you can do before you start to get bored and wander around the mansion doing odd-jobs, I've found..."

Wanda pointed at herself. "I am very good at making things break, not so much with the putting it back together. I am very glad to deliver my baby into more capable hands." She gave Callisto a once over and laughed. "Bored and willing to do odd-jobs? Be careful, they just might never let you go at that rate."

"Don't say that, someone'll hear you," Callisto quipped, smirking a little now and lifting a hand to run it through her wild dark hair.

"In this place, all you have to do is think hard enough and someone will pick up on it," came the teasing reply. "Which has its benefits and its downsides, I suppose." Especially, she thought with sudden amusement as she thought of Betsy and Haller, for couples.

"Well, fortunately for me I don't think very loud," Callisto said with a shrug. "I'm more of a do-er."

"Also a good thing, especially around here." Wanda glanced down at her watch and then looked up at Callisto with a interested look. "Have you been introduced to the wonders that is Harry's yet?" she asked. "I want to stop in and say hello to some folks, catch up, but I could use a drink afterwards if you are game."

Callisto pursed her lips in thought for a moment, then shrugged. "Sounds good. Haven't been anywhere out of the mansion in days. Harry's is where?"

Wanda grinned. "It's probably better if I just show you..."


~~

After saying her last goodbyes, Wanda had gone to collect Callisto. It was a short drive on the bike to Harry's and they were soon pulling up in front of it. She carefully balanced the bike as they stopped, adjusting to the weight of two riders and not just one. "And this," she said with a grand gesture, "is Harry's. Watering hole and sanity savior of the Xavier's staff."

Callisto hopped nimbly off the bike, pulling her helmet off and shaking her hair loose, taking in the sight of the small bar. "Well, you learn a new thing every day," she said with a smirk.

Wanda returned the smirk. "I'm going to assume you just learned the location of the bar on the back of my bike," she teased as they went in. She waved and blew a kiss to Harry where he stood behind the bar, who waved back and started to bring out two bottles. Wanda found them a table in the back and slumped down slightly, long legs sticking out slightly. "Harry is a man of few words but his beer makes up for that."

Collapsing gracefully into her own seat, shrugging her leather jacket and open button-down shirt off together onto the back to reveal that she'd at least changed out of her oil-stained vest (admittedly into another identical vest) before leaving the mansion, Callisto chuckled. "Well, that's the thing with bartenders, isn't it? They either talk way too much, or barely at all. I like barely at all."

"On that we agree." She waited until Harry dropped off the beers before turning back to her latest companion, taking a deep drink of the brew. "Oh, now this I missed. I love Finnigeans but Harry's is special. Probably because besides the mansion this was the first place I went to when I came to the states."

Callisto took a generous swig of her bottle before speaking, leaning back in her chair and appraising Wanda frankly. "When was that? I can't place your accent - you been here long, or..."

"I have been here a few years now," Wanda responded, a wistful look crossing her face, "but home, such as it is, started in the middle of nowhere Europe. Official place, you know. My family is Rom, the gypsies, so home is a couple of broken down looking trailers on some road over there. Which reminds me that I have not been home in ages..."

Callisto smiled a little. "Sounds nice, actually," she said, taking another drink of her beer and leaning forward again, lower arms resting on the table between them, short nails picking idly at the label on her bottle.

Wanda pillowed her chin on her hand, her look turning mischievous. "Oh it was, though my brother and I did our best to make as much trouble as possible. When you sometimes have to lighten people's pockets to survive, especially when they do not like your kind, well, it simply made being hellions that much easier. It prepared me rather well for adulthood." She toasted Callisto with her beer before taking a sip.

"Doesn't sound too dissimilar to my 'upbringing'," Callisto said, the ironic quotation clear in her tone. "Although I can't say I had a particularly nurturing family environment."

That got her a questioning look though Wanda left it up to the other woman if she felt like it was sharing time. Being an anthropologist meant she tended to be a nosy bitch at the best of times but she'd learned to temper that innate curiosity when it came to the living and breathing. Most of the time, anyway.

Well, you brought it up... Callisto sighed, pursing her lips and looking to her beer bottle. "Well, I'm a... I was a Morlock," she said simply. "Most of us didn't grow up in a two-point-four. I was on my own from pretty young."

Well, that explained a few things. "Like Sarah." It wasn't a question as Wanda took another sip of her beer. Wanda considered for a moment before continuing, "We work together these days in New York. She's been a good person to have at my back." Considering what she knew of, and from Sarah, it couldn't have been an easy life - but the other thing she'd picked up on was in situations like this, pity was something no one really wanted.

"She's a good kid." Only not really a kid anymore, and you don't really know her, Callisto reminded herself. She shot Wanda a tight smile. "Good to know she's a valued member, an' all that."

"You should see her bellydance with Mark. Though Mark still wins for the most outrageous events in the office - he came into work one day with a set of very...well." She laughed at the memory, head going back as she remembered walking into the office that day. "His rack that day was better than almost all of ours there. It was...impressive."

The other woman smiled in spite of herself, saying nothing, something unfamiliar and bittersweet tugging at her gut. She found that she was glad that Sarah was somewhere where people had a sense of humour, messed around, had... well, fun. The Morlocks had had their moments, of course, but it was hard to have much fun when you were living in sewers and electrical tunnels, scraping enough together to survive. Although if you're honest, you didn't help, did you? Everything's serious with you.

Wanda raised her bottle up to Callisto's. "Well, the night is still young and we, my dear, are still sober. And if I drink enough, Harry will eventually drag out the good stuff that no longer has a label on it. You in?"

Callisto raised an eyebrow. "If you think you can match me..." she said, a smirk growing on her face.


~~

Walking, more like stumbling, along the road back towards Xavier's, Wanda was singing cheerfully. It wasn't the best, or even in English, but it was cheerful and rather suggestive sounding, from just the tone. She glanced over at Callisto and hummed the last few bars. "My uncle did not believe in "lullabies" as such..."

"Oh, was that you trying to sing me to sleep?" Callisto asked with a chuckle. Her own walking seemed little impaired by drink, although it didn't carry its usual easy grace, and there was most definitely a slight slur to her usually clipped speech. "I'd like to get to bed first, if that's all right."

"I could cart you back to the mansion," came the cheerful reply, "I have done it before. I even guarantee no headers into trees." She would pick up her bike in the morning while she crashed at the mansion for the night. It was something that had happened before. Wanda frowned when she realized she couldn't see the road and a shaky red light flared around her hand for a moment. "There it is!" And she managed to skirt the hole on the side of the road.

"Christ, woman, ruin my night-vision, why don't you?" Callisto said, blinking and passing her hand over her eyes, stumbling just slightly as she waited for them to readjust. Now she looked a little drunk. She chuckled. "You don't wanna do that," she said. "I'm heavier than I look."

"And I..." Wanda hiccuped and shook her head. "Stronger than I look. Right Amazon, you know." She frowned over at Callisto. "Night vision as well? What else you hiding up those sleeves? Wait, that didn't make any sense..."

"Well, I have sleeves..." Callisto granted, hooking her fingers over the sleeves of her shirt. "I guess...strong arms?" she offered. "I could give you a ride. Certainly can't have you biking back to New York now. I'm told that's dangerous...

She made a piffle sound towards Callisto. "Cain can give me a piggy back ride --" And then some, she leered to herself. "And I tried Haller and he worked. Everyone else is kind of hard." Wanda started to walk backwards and wiggled her eyebrows. "You offerin' free piggy back rides, then?"

Callisto laughed. "Sweetheart, I could give Cain a piggy back," she said, suddenly all movement as she slung Wanda easily over her shoulder, carrying her 'fireman-style' for a moment before swinging her round to ride on her back a little more respectably, feeling a surge of self-confidence from the difference between this and her recent confusing experience with Morgan. That and yeah, she was drunk.

There was an almost inaudible squeak as Wanda got settled, clutching at Callisto's shoulders as she hooked her legs around her waist. "Well then," she said, giggling madly as she pointed down the road, "onward. I'd pay good money to see you give Cain a piggyback ride. Or just...the look on his face, oh god."

"He's not really my type," Callisto said with a chuckle, letting the cards fall where they may at this point in the evening's proceedings, getting a good safe grip on Wanda's legs before making her way up the track towards the mansion.

"You can't see it but I am leering. He was certainly was mine. Very life affirming, as it was." Cain was a good man. In more ways than one.

"Guess I go more for lean and leggy," the other woman replied, the half-smile still evident in her voice. She wanted to giggle, suddenly. She wanted to... run, or maybe build something, or... It was a strange and unfamiliar feeling. A moment later it hit her: She was having fun. A short laugh escaped her throat in spite of herself.

Wanda tightened her grip on the other woman's shoulders as she found herself laughing along. She certainly hadn't been expecting the type of evening that she had gotten but she was chalking it up to a good thing. Cheerfully, she tapped Callisto on the shoulder and pointed down the road. "Allons-y!" she proclaimed cheerfully.

"Is that French?" came the reply. "Speak American, woman." Nonetheless, Callisto did break into a run, then, bending forward slightly, her hands secure around Wanda's legs. The night air was fresh and clear after the warm day they'd had, the gentle breeze a welcome respite from the warm interior of Harry's. It was only now that Callisto realised she'd left her leather jacket at the bar, but far from irritating her, she just smiled. Guess I'll just have to go back for it sometime.