Wanda and Marie-Ange

[x-tarot.livejournal.com]

Backdated to August.

Wanda comes by Marie-Ange's office to talk about the switch in Wanda and MA's duties, and the tarot cards that Marie-Ange drew on before warning the team, and also relationships. Wanda declares Marie-Ange "normal". This will never happen again.



Wanda gingerly picked up the card in front of her by the tips of her fingers as if she were afraid it might come to life and bite her. But considering that they were Angie's card, that might not be far from the truth. She looked at the drawing that marred the face of it and shook her head. "So we have this, and you, to thank for the heads up," she said, fascinated despite herself. Her powers proved troublesome for Marie-Ange, telepaths and a wide range of other mutations; only the power of the Exemplars had allowed this breakthrough.

"I still do not know when I drew that." Marie-Ange had the rest of the vandalized set in front of her, ink drawings lined up to make the all too familiar symbol of the Cult of Cthon. "I had ink stains on my fingers but no missing time, it was like I just did not notice myself drawing on the cards."

"Is that normal? If it is not, then that might be my influence - I always make things just a little 'wacky'. It is part of my charm." The card rejoined its brethren and Wanda tilted her head to study them from where they lay on the desk. "I think looking at them like that gives me a headache ..."

"It gives you a headache?" Marie-Ange said, with one raised eyebrow and a shake of her head, and an amused smile. "It is ... I have drawn automatically before but never on my cards, not like this. I either lose time, or I am aware that I am seeing something, but never this... sort of middle ground. So it may be your fault, or some strange interaction between my power and the chaos, I am not sure."

Wanda's hand fluttered back in forth with that 'eh' connotation to it. "Perhaps all of the above. For every mutant power that is quantifiable, there is something like ours that comes along to mess things up. Some people say it keeps things interesting. I say it will keep my hairdressers in high money when my hair finally decides to go grey." She finally took a seat across from Marie-Ange. It wasn't like she'd been avoiding the real reason she'd come; she'd simply gotten distracted by the cards. Avoidance had simply been an added benefit.

"We can just dye your hair with the last of my india ink." Marie-Ange said. "I may as well give you the rest of it, no?" She wasn't smiling, not exactly but it was impossible to be entirely grouchy at Wanda. She was Wanda. If you were horrible at her she just looked at you and ... it was just impossible to keep being grouchy. "So I know you are not here just to admire my card graffiti?"

"You know, even back at the mansion, I always thought you were too smart for your own good." Wanda half smiled, half grimaced. "Until further notice, I have taken myself out of the field. Thanks to our friendly neighborhood chaos god, if I die, he gets loose. The chance of a misstep in the heat of the moment is too much. So, with that in mind, how would you feel about swapping some of your work for more time in the field?"

"I was cheeky then too." Marie-Ange said, smirking. "When is 'further notice'? Because if I come back from the field and David is back already and has stolen his office back from me, I am blaming you." She liked having an office. It meant quiet and privacy and less chance of someone walking in while she was sending dirty text messages to Wade. "Quite seriously though, I think that is a wise decision."

Wanda smirked back, knowing exactly what she used to do with four sturdy walls and a door that closed. And locked. She sometimes missed that office back at university - there were some interesting memories from inside that room. "Hopefully not terribly long. Amanda and Stephen are hard at working to find a solution and they have our entire network to call upon for help. Until then, you get to foist your paperwork off on me and I get to foist a number of overseas meetings on you. I am not terribly certain who wins and loses in that situation." Plus, of course, she thought, any missions in the field.

"I win. I get to travel all over the world and put delicious food on my expense account, and you get to try to spend all day on the phone with not only my contacts, but Betsy and David's as well." Marie-Ange said, beaming. Of course, she also got to ruin any chance of a sleep schedule, fly coach and eat airport food and keep track of which identity she was using on what trips, but that was not nearly as funny as gloating.

"You do realize that Illyana had to get her ... creative filing from someone, yes?" Actually, that was a lie. Illyana had managed to create a filing system that was at once brilliant, mean and crazy all by herself. Still. Wanda grinned. "It is sort of like letting each other borrow our shoes. We get to try them out, see how nice all the new shoes are and eventually return them because our feet do not quite fit in them. Wait. That is a horrible metaphor but yet now I am left with a desire to go through your closet ..."

Marie-Ange shook her head and laughed. "You are eleven feet tall, why would you need to wear my heels?" She was not exactly short herself but Wanda was tall. She held up two fingers in a faux-salute "I promise if I see anything fabulous while I am taking over your contact routes I will buy them for you. Amanda will be overjoyed, because I will stop trying to convince her to wear colors other than black and white into the office. She dresses like Pete! When did that happen?" Maybe she was a little fixated.

"There are those in this office who seek to emulate Pete Wisdom? Never!" Wanda smothered a laugh. "I suppose it could be worse - she could have subscribed to the Jubilation Lee Way of Dress. Not saying there is anything particularly wrong with it but it is not for everyone, that is for sure."

"I am saying there is something wrong with it. She wears bright yellow!" Marie-Ange complained. "It is like having a hyperactive iridescent hummingbird in the office, between the bright colours and the amount of sugar she puts in things." No matter that Jubilee needed the sugar, it was still like having a tiny hovering bird.

There was no way Wanda was about to smother the laughter now and she leaned back in her chair as she covered her face with her hand. "I think we just found Jubilee's next mission call sign," she said, the image not fading from her mind of Jubilee buzzing around the office as a hummingbird. It really was not that far off from the truth. "She might get too much of a kick out of it, though."

"She laughed when I called her Seagull." Marie-Ange said dryly. "Do you think if we switched her to Hummingbird she would stop pretending to be a cartoon seagull? I think I can accept her liking her call sign if it means we no longer have her cawing "mine mine" when we bring food into the office."

Wanda winced slightly at that as she sometimes had dreams that she woke up to find Jubilee hovering near her bed saying that exact phrase. "Are hummingbirds potentially annoying?" she asked, trying to remember the last time she had to even think about a hummingbird.

Marie-Ange thought about this. "Ah, they hum. Perhaps. But she does that already, and it is better than popping her chewing gum." She bent and dug around in a desk drawer for a few moments. "Here, I had gotten peanut butter candy for Doug but he and I cannot have a conversation without fighting. I imagine he would be amenable to bribery to change Jubilee's login names if you gave it to him."

After accepting the thing of peanut butter candy, Wanda tugged out a pen that she'd stuck behind her ear (it had slowly migrated out to somewhere above her ear, entangled in her hair) and wrote "D. Ramsey bribe" on the side of the package. If Doug saw it, he would be the last one to be upset by it and it would prevent Wanda from accidentally eating it herself. "I was going to try and figure out a subtle yet clever way of asking how that was going but, thankfully, you circumvented my needing to think of something subtle yet clever."

"It... comes and goes. On some days we seem to be fine, and on others it is like we cannot even look at each other without some sort of fight." Marie-Ange said with a frown. "I would ask if that is normal but what does it matter, nothing anyone does here is ever normal."

"Would it help if I said it were normal?" Wanda asked as she settled back in her chair. "As normal as we can get, perhaps. Emotions are horrible, terrible things that often get in the way of civility and normalcy no matter how hard we try to curb them. Being civil to each other over breakfast and wanting to rip his eyes out over dinner seems perfectly normal to me, all things considered."

"Oh, thank goodness. I am finally normal." Marie-Ange said wryly. "Sofia will be overjoyed, I can cancel my therapy."