Garrison/Callisto: Body Work

[x-dominion.livejournal.com]

Garrison makes a dedicated effort to avoid dealing with his issues through automative therapy, and runs into his erstwhile mechanic in the process.



Yes, it was a coping mechanism. Avoidance was one of the classic ways to not deal with grief, shoving yourself into a tiny corner where no one else could get to you. Given that Adrienne had all but fled following her psychosomatic examination of the dogtags, Kane took it as a hint that he wasn't good company right now. Instead, he was out in the garage. The battered hulk of a Crown Vic that Callisto had helped him find was looking fantastic under the hood, and while the interior was never going to have a new car smell, the woman had found the original black interior seats somewhere, and had replaced the ruined ones.

It was never going to be a beauty prize, but the car looked serviceable and Garrison indulged himself in an hour of sanding down the sidepanels, removing three different layers of durable paint, slowly making his way to the metal beneath.

"Y'know, we have a handheld orbit sander somewhere around here." Callisto always seemed start talking without announcing her presence. Perhaps she expected that most people, as she would, would be aware of her before she spoke. Perhaps she thought it was cool, just 'stepping from the shadows' as it were. She'd never done the villain thing, not really, but in another world she might've made a good one, what with her brooding looks and lurking tendencies. Not so much just now, though, stepping forward to rest a bony elbow on the roof of the car; her once-black teeshirt had the remains of a Batman symbol on it. It was only the second time Garrison had ever seen her not in a boiler suit, though her worn, stained jeans looked like they'd served as a replacement for one at some point in the past anyway.

"Decided not to leave her patchwork bodywork, then, huh?"

"Theraputic effort. Besides," Kane grunted as he worked. "I need to get the weather seal on, so it needs to at least be even. Who puts three different layers of paint work on the body of the same cop car? Was it owned by the cop from the Village People or something?" He said, his mouth on auto-pilot.

If Callisto got this reference she either didn't find it funny or was very restrained. Hard call. "So I shouldn't offer to help, then." It was said in a tone that suggested she probably hadn't been going to anyway.

"I think I owe you enough time on this car already. I'd offer to pay, but I get the feeling that you wouldn't be interested. Or you might. I don't know. Goddamn door levers." Kane muttered, still dribbling on verbally.

Callisto shrugged. "I've got a job," she said simply. "What would I do with more money?"

"Buy happiness. I'm told that is the accepted-- motherfucker!" The Canadian pulled his hand back and rubbed the deep scrape on the side of it. "The accepted solution. Get drinks with little umbrellas in them, that sort of thing."

"Yeah, how do you drink those without spearing the roof of your mouth?" Callisto mused. Then added, "I guess you're not s'posed to use them in beer bottles." This time she had to be joking. She leaned over a little to survey the damage to Garrison's hand. "Maybe it's just as well you aren't using the orbit sander..."

"Healing factor will catch up with it soon enough." Kane muttered, absently wiping away the spots of blood. "Besides, I've already lost a limb this year. I'd hate to seem like I'm getting stale with my routine."

Garrison snatched a cloth from the worktable and swabbed off his hand. "Seriously, though, I appreciate the work on the car. It looks great."

"I dunno about that. But it'll run." Callisto shrugged again, perhaps modestly, or perhaps just slightly uncomfortable with the compliment.

"Surrounded by these European penis extensions that it can chase down and grind up, yeah, it looks great." He tossed the cloth into the bin, the long scratch no longer even oozing. Kane's healing factor wasn't even in the same league as Logan's, but it did have advantages.

Callisto smirked, glancing around at the other cars in the garage. "You kinda get off on parking the junk-yard reject with the heart of gold next to these, don't ya?"

"Something like that. Call it an expression of middle class sensibilities." Kane crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the side of the car. "Besides, after you've seen your tenth major road racing accident, with a high performance import crumpled up like an empty beercan at an Argos game, you kind of look at cars in a different way."

"Mm." Callisto shrugged, although it was uncertain what this was a response to. Then something seemed to occur to her. "You know, if you want your bodywork reinforced, I could probably rig something up..." She trailed off, suddenly feeling a little silly for offering her help when they had an engineering wizard like Forge around. Sure, she knew her stuff, but it wasn't as if superhumanly attuned to the things. She 'covered up' her embarrassment with an unexpected scowl.

"Crown Victoria is set up to handle armor insets. They take them out before sale, but the slots are still there in the body. I wouldn't object to something that gives me more integrity in case of a crash, or, you know, another fucking ambush."

Callisto raised an eyebrow. "Uh. I guess I could keep an eye out, then, see what I can pull together. I mean," she added with another slight smirk, "assuming you don't want to just requisition the institute. You probably could. But I'm guessing that would be cheating at this point?"

"No, I'll cover it. Until Alpha Flight gets settled, I'm still drawing a paycheck from Department H, the RCMP and from the FBI. Considering the Professor seems to cover all the expenses here, even with supporting my sister's education, I've got enough to splurge on some features." Kane said, counting off on his fingers. "Just let me know what you need."

Looking a little on the stunned side, Callisto nodded. "Sure. I'll think about it."

"I appreciate it." Garrison straightened up from the car. "Screw this. I'm going to go get a drink."

Callisto looked mildly amused. "Well, you know what they say," she offered.

"That it's five o'clock somewhere? Yes. Yes I do."