xp_logs | Topaz and Sue (Backdated)

The scientist meets the witch. This could end one of two ways. Backdated to November 9.

Sue was getting the weirdest feeling of reverse deja-vu as she peeked around the doorway of her suite. This must be how Layla felt when she found me, the blonde thought. Standing in the middle of the suite was a young Indian girl, obviously a new suite mate. Sue pulled her head back, a wicked grin pasting itself across her face as she focused for a moment wrapping a force-field around herself. Satisfied she was invisible the blonde slowly made her way through the door and across the room careful to make as little noise as possible. "Boo!"

Despite the fact that she had half-been expecting it - mischievous intent was easy to pick out, especially when no one else was around - it was still a shock to Topaz when a disembodied voice yelled right behind her. She whirled around, her eyes wide for a moment before narrowing in suspicion. "Who's there?"

Struggling not to burst out laughing Sue settled herself into an armchair behind Topaz before letting her force-field drop. "Hi there," she said smiling brightly at the other girl.

"Hello," Topaz said uncertainly. Invisibility. That was a new one. "Not to be rude, but who are you?"

"I'm Sue, I live through there," the blonde nodded at one of the doors leading off the main living area. "You're living with Molly..." Sue paused expectantly.

Topaz nodded, gesturing toward the door leading to the room she shared with the younger blonde. "I'm Topaz," she filled in the pause, her voice taking on a cautious tone as she waited for Sue's reaction.

"Topaz like the silicate?" Sue asked curiously, "so that raises the question Texas or Utah?"

Topaz blinked a couple of times. "...Neither if you're asking where I'm from." She fingered her necklace unconsciously as she spoke.

"More along the lines of topaz being their state stone" Sue explained cocking her head at the other girl. "Your accent, British?"

"Yeah," Topaz nodded, finally realizing what she was doing and dropping her arm to her side again. "Sorry, I don't know much about state stones, not really from around here."

"It's just one of those random bits and pieces you pick up, not really all that useful unless you want to get into politics or something I guess." The blonde shook her head, "I used to get really bored in class so I read," she offered by way of explanation.

Hmn. When Topaz got bored in class, she experimented. Well, to each their own. She resumed her wandering of the common area, heading to the kitchenette after a moment. "I'll keep it in mind." She liked random bits of information. "So invisibility, huh?" She was still trying to get used to being around other mutants all the time.

"Of a sorts yeah," Sue replied, not really wanting to explain the mechanics behind her invisibility. "So, what about you? Do you fly, or perhaps breathe fire or turn into a sheep or something?" The blonde asked curiously waving a hand in the air as she spoke.

Sheep? Did people actually turn into sheep? "Nothing nearly as flashy," Topaz said with a shrug. "I'm an empath."

"Empath...so you know what I'm feeling? That's got to be pretty useful." Sue pulled a face as she focused, "So what am I feeling now?"

Not really one to step down from a challenge, Topaz tilted her head, narrowing her eyes for a moment. There was a surface happiness, of course, but something else momentarily brushed against Topaz's mind. Nothing big, but enough to poke at natural curiosity. Not unhappiness, exactly...but loneliness, perhaps? Longing? "You...miss someone," she said after a long moment, speaking slowly.

It was all Sue could do to keep her jaw from dropping, as it was her eyes shot open and she sat up straight form her position lying in the chair. "Whaa," she exclaimed her mouth opening and closing like a fish. She blinked and slowly managed to exert control over herself, "I, my brother," she said in a small voice looking down at her clenched hands, "he had to move to California and I got to see him for a day or two over Thanksgiving." What she didn't mention was it was her fault that he'd got caught up in the situation and had to move in the first place. I thought that I'd managed to hide it better, the blonde thought as a teardrop fell onto her lap and she savagely scrubbed the back of a hand over her eyes.

Topaz blinked, slightly shell-shocked. She hadn't exactly been expecting Sue to say anything. God knew she wouldn't have. "I'm...sorry," she murmured after a moment, clasping her hands behind her back and looking down at the floor. She wasn't good at comforting people. Ironically enough. Well, there was one tried and true fallback, at least. And she was already in the kitchen. "Would you like some tea?" She asked, already moving to make the warm beverage. Tea was good. Alice had always made her tea when she was upset.

Sue smiled wanely at Topaz and nodded, her eyes a little red, "Thanks," she replied softly. "So you like to watch Big Bang then?"

There wasn't a single word in that sentence that made any sense whatsoever to Topaz. "What?" Was the only thing she could think to say as she turned on the stove to heat the water and went in search of the tea bags she'd hidden in the cupboard after her fourth straight night of not being able to sleep and sneaking to the downstairs kitchen.

"You know, The Big Bang Theory," Sue explained mirroring Topaz's confusion. "'Social protocol states when a friend is upset you offer them a hot beverage,'" She quoted, "You mean to tell me you've never seen it before?"

"Is it a movie?" Now Topaz was just lost. Movies and telly hadn't been a big thing in the Ashdown house.

"TV series," the blonde explained, "One of the bigger ones around now. So since we've established that you don't watch TV what do you do for fun?" Sue asked curiously tucking her feet underneath herself as she gratefully accepted a cup of tea from Topaz.

Topaz sat down on the edge of the couch with her own cup cradled between her fingers."I read," she said simply, shrugging. It wasn't a lie - she did read. It wasn't the only thing she did, but it was one thing.

"Really? Me too. What kinda books do you like then?" Sue asked taking an experimental sip from her tea before blowing on it. Still to hot to drink.

"I don't really have a specific preference," Topaz said with a shrug as she sipped her own tea carefully. "Do love fantasies, though. You?"

"Mostly science or engineering books," Sue replied, "I don't really read that much fiction outside of class. Sometimes I'll leaf through one of the classics."

"Not much of a mystical person, then," Topaz said with a faint smile. She wondered what Sue's reaction would be if she told the blonde about magic.

"Mystical? Not really," Sue agreed, "I've seen the documentaries and stuff, but in the end science can explain everything. Or will explain it one day, we're not quite there yet." she replied echoing Topaz's smile.

"'There are more things in heaven and earth, than are dreamt in your philosophy,'" Topaz quoted in a monotone. Shakespeare wasn't really her cup of tea, but that was a quote that had always stuck out to her.

"To explain all nature is too difficult a task for any one man or even for any one age. `Tis much better to do a little with certainty, and leave the rest for others hat come after you, than to explain all things." Sue returned with a smile.

"Who decided everything needs an explanation?" Topaz asked, tilting her head. "I get that human nature makes us feel like we need to know everything, but some things you just have to take on faith, yeah?"

Sue leaned back in her chair, ""No-one decided that, it's just the way it is; if something happens then it can be explained." The blonde gestured out of the window, "'Fifteen hundred years ago everybody knew the Earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat,' they couldn't explain the mysteries of the universe so they had to have faith. But one by one science is finding explanations for everything around us."

"But the Earth was never the center of the universe and never flat. Those were facts just waiting to be discovered," Topaz returned. "They're concrete. But what about the abstract? What about things like religion, or magic?" Not that she was at all religious, and would never claim to be. It was just the first example that came to mind.

"What about them?" Sue asked. "There is nothing to be explained there, that's why they're abstracts. Besides magic always used to be used as a catch-all to explain the unexplained. Like you said, facts that were waiting to be discovered."

"I'm guessing you don't believe in magic, then." Topaz was enjoying this, though Sue wouldn't be able to tell just by looking at her. The blonde's answer was going to be interesting.

Sue took a moment to consider Topaz's question as she took another sip from her tea, "I agree that a sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic," she replied, "Clarke's 3rd law."

"So what are people that practice magic?" Topaz's tone was flat, but she was highly amused now.

"You mean people like Penn and Teller?" Sue queried, "They're really, really good at what they do. And street magicians too. I honestly can't tell how they do those tricks."

"...No. I meant more like myself. And Billy."

"You're a witch?" Sue blurted out in surprise.

That had been just as much fun as Topaz had hoped it would be. "Yeah, I am. And I'm definitely not one of those cheap street performers."

"Hey now, Penn and Teller are hardly cheap," Sue replied her mind still struggling to absorb this new information. "So by magic do you mean things like Harry Potter? Or like the ability to control the weather or something?"

"Well I don't wave a magic wand if that's what you're askin'," Topaz returned in a vaguely amused voice. "It depends on the person and the spell, really. Anything can happen." It was one of the things that made magic so thrilling.

Sue narrowed her eyes, "That's pretty vague," she pointed out with a small smile. "So it really depends one hte person what they can do? Kinda like everyone here and their mutant powers then?"

"It depends on the person, yeah. But it also depends on the power source. There are lots of different power sources, those effect spells as well." She was being purposely vague. Getting into a whole magic lesson wasn't exactly appealing.

"So different people have different powersources and different results?" Sue queried, genuinely confused, before she shook her head. "And you wonder why people have trouble believing in magic." she smiled at Topaz. "It kinda sounds like some kind of secondary mutation. Or maybe one of those luck manipulating ones."

"There are people who use magic who aren't mutants, though," Topaz pointed out. "Actually, until I came here I was the only person I knew of who was a mutant and a witch." She understood Sue's confusion, though. Things always got a bit confusing when magic was brought into the mix.

"How did you know?" Sue asked. "I mean I had no idea I was a mutant until," the blondes eye's clouded over for a second, "until this," she continued waving her hand around the mansion. "There could be peope who were mutants, could do stuff without ever realizing."

"How did I know I was a mutant?" Topaz rubbed the back of her head, remembering the day she'd manifested. "I didn't, not at first. Just thought I was going mad. It was my...parents...who finally made the connection." She tangled her fingers in her hair, pressing her lips together for a moment. "I never thought about that, though. Is it really possible to spend your life being a mutant and never knowing?"

"I guess there must be, I mean I almost didn't realize. Everyone feels invisible during highschool at one point or another. I might have just attributed it to that if I hadn't manifested the way I did. Or maybe when some people manifest they could see themselves as gaining magic powers. There are a lot of people who would find that idea really cool."

"Maybe. But even then you would have to admit that something is different, even if you don't know you're a mutant." This conversation had turned strangely philosophical. Which wasn't all together bad. "I see your point, though."

"Yeah," Sue agreed, "You'd realize something was different, just diagnosing what would be the hard part."

"That usually is, though." Topaz settled back in the chair, curling up with her cup of tea. She had a feeling this conversation was going to go on for a while.