xp_logs | Callie & Julian, An Old Friend

Julian finds Callie studying as he ventures through the mansion.

Old memories flooded back as he strolled the hallways of what was once his home. Julian paused to straighten a painting, making a note to comment to Gibney on his shoddy work. There were so many new faces, people he'd not yet met but would soon enough- after his visit with the Professor, he hadn't seen anyone he knew from years ago. The events of the past few weeks were coupling with the changed, familiar surroundings to bring him to a healthy level of brooding. Turning a corner into a lounge, he finally spotted someone he knew and the brooding mostly went away. "Pointy ears, pink skin, by herself...must be a geek in her natural habitat," he grinned, leaning against the entryway.

Curled up in an armchair, Callie was reading for pleasure deeply engrossed in a hefty book balanced against her raised knees. True to form, she was oblivious to the world. Well, not completely. She heard someone, a man, say something, but she paid it no mind. While her little corner was generally quiet and still, the mansion was still a place inhabited by many people and there was always the chance that the paths of residents would cross whether intentional or not. And if Callie let herself be distracted every time someone near by uttered a sound, she would have never been able to study.

So Julian was able to get away with his comment without raising protest from the geek in her natural habitat.

Rolling his eyes, her old friend figured she was deaf to the world. Focusing, Julian gave a slight telekinetic nudge at Callie's book, "Earth to Callie. Why don't we put that down?"

The book glowed green in her hands. Now he had her attention, and Callie knew precisely who "he" was. Or she was mostly sure she did. She had once seen that green glow so often that at one point green spots would float around objects even when a certain telekinetic was nowhere to be found. But it was only when she turned her head at the sound of his voice that Callie confirmed that it was indeed Julian Keller in the flesh.

"Julian!" The book was closed and abandoned on the chair's seat as she rose and crossed the room in long, fluid strides, throwing her arms around the neck of her former classmate and pulling him into a tight hug.

"Hey dork," Julian grinned and hugged her slight form back. Her smell filled his nostrils and brought him back to better times, before he'd returned to the West. "How's my favorite tree hugger?"

She beamed and stepped back to study him, her hands remaining on her shoulders. It wasn't until Callie had seen Julian standing there that she realized how much she missed him. And as she reminded him of better times, his presence stirred up emotions she hadn't felt in a long time. He hadn't been there for her transformation from mild mannered girl to vicious mutate, and she never had to worry over the possibility of some lingering conditioning telling her to attack. He was safe. And he was here. Speaking of...

"What are you doing here?" He was bigger than she remembered. More muscle, which she had noticed when he hugged her, and she could have sworn they used to be the same height, but now her eye level was slightly below his. A look of concern settled onto her features. "Is everything all right? Did something happen?"

Julian chuckled, taking the sight of her slight frame in- "Is anything ever okay if I'm here?" he smirked. "You didn't hear? My dad was arrested and sentenced for funding terrorists among other things. My family was...divested, from our fortune and now I'm back, for a while at least." Shaking his head after the brief summary of his most recent woe he continued, "It's been too long! What are you reading?"

Callie's face dropped as she listened to her friend's tale. "Oh Julian," she whispered and embraced him once more. "I'm so sorry."

Julian shrugged, forcing a smile, "Nah, don't worry about it, Callie. My dad...he'll only be in prison for 15 years, and since he was still contributing money to various anti-mutant terrorism groups it should probably be longer. I'm fine- really, just...significantly poorer." He recalled the number he'd seen in his ledgers before getting out of the limo in front of the mansion, it was less than he'd ever seen before.

"How much poorer," she asked quietly, her face full of concern. "What about your mom and sister?"

"Brother, actually" he reached a hand up and ruffled his hair- a habit born of a time when it was longer. "They're fine. The government froze my father's funds, but luckily, he'd had no control over my trust for years, so they just took a, um, modest penalty, and left me the rest. I gave them half...it should last a few months." With a sigh and a slight shift in his posture, "I think I have eleven-million left, last I checked." He knew exactly how much was left, but that number was only until the property he'd purchased earlier cleared in the morning.

It had been so long since they had actually spoken, Callie wouldn't let herself feel too bad that she had forgotten the sex of Julian's sibling. Besides her thoughts were somewhere else entirely. "Eleven. Million. Dollars." She stared at her friend in disbelief. "Eleven. Million. Dollars. Julian." Callie gave his shoulder a less-than gentle shove. "That's significantly poorer? Half of infinity is still infinity. I thought you were going to tell me that they froze all your assets and you had the clothes on your back and whatever cash you found in the couch cushions or random pairs of jeans."

He smirked, "Do you know how much money I had before my father was arrested? Eleven million may seem like a lot, but between moving back to New York, buying a penthouse and paying tuition...it doesn't stretch as far as you'd think. Besides, I'm investing all but a million or so, I'll need a revenue stream now that I'm without a family fortune to fall back on." Julian chuckled, "It seems like I lose that every time I come back here."

"You bought a penthouse?" She sighed heavily and shook her head. Regardless of what he thought about his new financial situation, the fact that he could just drop a bunch of cash (or she assumed it was cash, the 20-something son of someone who was convicted of funding terrorists was not exactly a safe person for a bank to lend to) on a penthouse in the city meant that Julian was far from being in dire straits. Callie may not have been as wealthy as him, but her dad was a highly sought after landscape architect. Or horticultural design consultant, whatever it was they were calling him these days.

"Julian, you ass, of course your money doesn't seem like it'll stretch very far when you do things like that." Her words may have scolding, but there was no weight behind them. Callie was even smiling even though she knew she ought not to. But this was just so typically Julian, and it was part of his charm. "You know the Professor would let you stay here. And how are you going to take care of yourself living alone. Do you even know how to do your laundry? Or do the dishes? Or anything?"

"I don't understand the question," he laughed and gave Callie a huge hug. "I am not completely helpless you know. And I can't stay here...though I'll be around, Professor Xavier agreed to let me help out as a mentor for the New Mutants." He let her go, "I'm glad to see you, Callie, there's so many new faces around here."

"Why not?" She looked heartbroken, and she was. So much so that she couldn't bring herself to comment that him mentoring the New Mutants was akin to allowing the fox to guard the henhouse. But the Professor wouldn't had agreed had he thought Julian would be unable to handle the task well. "There are plenty of rooms. And there are a number of us who go to the city for classes. And you'd be safe, much safer than being alone." And I wouldn't be so lonely, she thought.

"Why come back if you're just going to leave again?"

"The purchase of the penthouse isn't finalized yet- then they'll be the process of decorating it and everything," he smiled and put a hand on her shoulder, "I'll be here for a couple weeks at least." He noted the lonely look across the brow and eyes of his pink-skinned friend, "Hey, what's wrong?"

Callie gave him a weak smile. "It just gets kinda lonely here. All these new kids, people leaving, you know."

Julian's lips quirked downward, his face full of concern, "Why don't you move into the city?"

"I did." She chuckled at the memory of the apartment she had shared with Amara. "Then a bunch of us were kidnapped, and I was turned into a brainless, soulless pumped up mutant fighting machine. Fred ended up convincing me it would be good for me to come back and get help instead of holing up in my apartment alone and get stoned when I couldn't handle thinking about the whole thing, or what little I remember."

"What a pair we make."

Julian's eyebrows were raised as high as they could, "Huh...wow. Just...wow." He didn't know what to say. "I'm so sorry, Callie," he squeezed her shoulder. "Are you okay?"

"I'm better now." The more she said what happened the easier it became. "Relatively speaking. You know." She inhaled deeply and sighed.

"I do," he smiled and nodded. "There's a certain..." he paused, thinking of the right word to use, "mental resiliency, to those who pass through these halls as a student." A life-skill he'd put to good use recently.

Callie smiled a small, weary smile and hugged Julian once more. Hugging was easier than talking, especially when you didn't know what to say. His father funding terrorists? She knew there was more to the story than what he had told her, but he would tell her in good time. Along with everything else that had transpired during his time on the West Coast. As she would regale him with tales from her own life. But now she would hug her friend and welcome him back.