Miles, Matt, and Scott, Saturday morning
Feb. 14th, 2015 10:45 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsScott shows Miles and Matt around the mansion. They're sold pretty quickly.
Leaning against the subway wall, Matt waited for Miles to arrive. They'd chosen a subway so central to both of them to meet at and then head up to Westchester. A car would have been easier, but a cab to take them was unreasonably expensive and not much faster. It felt strange meeting Miles in street clothes, but it wasn't like they could take the subway as their alter-egos.
Matt wore jeans for the Saturday along with a Henley shirt and hoodie, though it was all hidden under his jacket. Grey fingerless gloves helped keep his hands warm wrapped around his cane. Turning his head as he heard Miles' heartbeat, he wondered if the teen was as excited and nervous as he was. This could be both really amazing or really awful.
With a good alibi to his parents for his absence and his costume under his clothes (just in case), Miles swiped his metro card to pass the turnstile into the subway station. He recognized Matt's face immediately and couldn't hide his smile as he headed over to him. Miles clearly felt this was going to be more great than awful. "Hey. 'Sup?"
"You ready for an adventure?" Matt asked, taking a sip of his latte from the subway coffee shop. He didn't have his costume on, but he had his mask in a pocket and his cane turned into his billy club. Useful, that.
"Word. Nice threads. Good idea to pose as a blind man. It'll look a lot less weird for me and you to travel together. I should've thought about something like that."
Matt smirked, debating whether to tell the truth or not. "Oh yeah, great cover," he echoed, too amused. Heading to the platform and the train, Matt slipped headphones on and listened to a book on his iPod for the train ride north.
One subway, one commuter train, and one taxi later . . .
Paying the cabbie, Matt paused outside taking everything in. The smell of the air, the sounds. This was not the city anymore. "You ready to do this then?"
It was almost too much green. But holy crap at that house. It was like something straight out of that silly British show that Miles's mom and abuela together watched every week. And he might get a chance to live in it? It was almost too good to be true. He nodded at Matt and walked up the lot with him to the front door. "Aren't you going to take that off now?" he asked as he rang the bell.
The door to the mansion swung open with an ominous creak revealing tall man wearing, would you believe it, sunglasses too. "Matt Murdock and Miles Morales?" he asked stepping outside to give the departing taxi a quick glance. "We've been expecting you."
"Yeah, that's not at all creepy," Miles muttered.
"We are," Matt agreed, resisting the urge to make a smart remark. This was why he was the grown up. "You must be Scott, Warren said he told you we were coming," he offered his hand for a handshake.
"Scott Summers," Scott introduced himself shaking Matt's proffered hand and nodding at Miles, "Welcome to Xavier's. So Warren's told you about the place?"
"Only a little," Miles replied. "Safe place for people like us, great teachers, good high schools nearby so I can lie to my parents about what I'm really here for. Standard stuff."
"Excellent, sounds like he hit all the basic points then," Scott acknowledged with a smile, "So, where would you like to start? It's a little cold outside right now, but as you can see the mansion comes with fairly extensive grounds, we even have some woodland and a quarry. Plus our own lake and boathouse for when the weather warms up."
Matt didn't say anything about the grounds, "Reasonably secluded," he agreed, trying to push his hearing as far as he could. There were very different sounds here than in the city. "Let's start inside then. I'm curious about what sort of powers you have experience with and training to use them," Given possible registration and the general feeling towards mutants, Matt wondered about how they did that.
"Sounds good to me," Scott stepped back inside waiting for the younger men to catch up, "We're pretty experienced with most varieties of powers. We've been doing this a while and have had people pass through with powers all over the spectrum, energy manipulators, physical mutations, enhanced senses even the odd psychic or two." Scott paused and looked at the others, "This isn't the way we normally do these tours, but I guess we can start from the basement and work our way up," that way they could end in the kitchen, that was always a high point. Stepping to the side the X-man pressed a button disguised in the wall revealing an elevator, "After you?" he offered indicating the newly revealed life.
Ooh, fancy. Miles stepped inside and leaned against the wall as the other men joined him. "This place is been around for a while, then? How long have you been teaching here?"
"All my life, I'm 37 now and I arrived when I was your age, I was one of the first students here," Scott allowed slipping off his glasses, "I came back and took up a position here after university, and have been here ever since. With the odd sabbatical or two."
Matt assumed he meant Miles' age and not his own or that wouldn't be quite so impressive. "How is it that people haven't figured out what you do?" He asked, surprised at how long they'd been around. "I assume some mutants have physical mutations?" Like Warren.
"They do, some mutants are entirely recognizable as mutants while others are. But honestly, if you didn't know him, would you have guessed Warren is a mutant?" he asked rhetorically, "A lot of people can get by without too much effort, and for those who can't, we have image transducers. Some of the tech heads cobbled together some holographic watches, without specialized equipment or extraordinary senses you wouldn't even realize that what you were seeing is an illusion."
The elevator dinged when they reached the right floor, and the doors opened to reveal what Miles could only describe as OOH SHINY. It was like an Apple store but better. "Wow. What classes do you teach down here?"
"The best classes of all," Scott replied opening a door and ushering the younger men inside just in time for a fireball to woosh up against the window to the room overlooking a large cave-like room. "We teach powers stuff down here, out of the way so no one can stumble across people training." He gestured out of the window, "Welcome to the Danger Room, something like a holochamber from Star Trek. We can create any scenario in here, and so can use it to train any combination of powers. Teamwork, control, everything, everyone who stays at the mansion is taught to control their powers, and then we can expand the training regimen from there if they want."
"Holochamber?" Matt repeated, interested, but also amused. He'd be able to see through a hologram. "Sounds interesting. Teamwork makes me think you've got some extracurriculars similar to ours," he assumed Warren had explained how they'd all met. "Am I understanding you correctly?"
If Warren's pitch hadn't been enough for Miles, then the Enterprise Holodeck Except Real and in the Basement sure sealed the deal. "Warren wasn't kidding," he finally said after several moments of wide-eyed astonishment. "Do we even need the rest of the tour now? What can you do, Mister S? If that's not rude to ask."
"I thought that might sell it," Scott allowed with a smile, the danger room was always the high point of a tour, "Well the truth is," he looked around conspiratorially, "I'm Superman. Well not really, more of just the eye blasts part of it," he confided. "It's not rude, I mean our powers are why we're here after all." He nodded at Matt, "We have a team that's similar to what you used to do." he allowed, "Like you we try to intervene in situations that let us save people's lives, wherever and whoever they are."
"And day jobs?" Matt asked, thinking of his own. He had no problems learning about his powers and other mutations or working as a team, but he wasn't giving up his career either, "I'm a lawyer and I can't just quit to do this," not when he just passed his bar exam and needed to establish his credentials.
"We all need to earn money and do something with ourselves," Scott allowed with a nod, "several of us work at the local school, or have jobs working in the city or nearby. There are no shortage of organizations affiliated with us who need workers if that's what you want, or if you have a job already. We're sort of somewhere between a hostel and a block of apartments. Everyone has a suite they might share, but then we all gather together to do things together like a baseball game or barbecue on the weekends. It's nice to have somewhere where you can relax and not worry about being a mutant."
Miles held up a hand. "Espera. Did you just say you have a team? I know you guys! You totally saved me from getting killed a few months ago." Matt seemed confused so he continued. "I was looking into the murder of this mutant guy in Brooklyn. Jumbo Carnation. Big fat gay fashion designer. Thought it was a hate crime y los puercos weren't doing anything about it. Turned out to just be a gang hit and I would've eaten it if a couple of other mutants who were also investigating didn't show up in the nick of time. I don't really remember anything besides them saying they're mutant good guys who do this stuff all the time. It must have been you guys." The astonishing coincidence made Miles laugh. This was fate, he was sure of it.
The worked for Matt, though the commute even on a good day would be a bitch. Maybe he could telecommute or just come to the school on the weekends and see how things went before he moved? It had taken them a good hour if not slightly more to get here now. "I remember that," Matt replied, "I wasn't there, Brooklyn's a little far for me, but I remember the case in the newspaper," that is, it made a tiny perfunctory list of recent crimes the paper put out each day. "Well, Mr. Summers, you have our interest."
"Well," Scott glanced down at his watch before looking over at the two young men, "It's almost lunchtime so why don't we head upto the kitchen and see what's on the menu today?" he asked, "We do tend to have pretty good meals most days, and then after lunch I can show you around the suites and the rest of the mansion."
Leaning against the subway wall, Matt waited for Miles to arrive. They'd chosen a subway so central to both of them to meet at and then head up to Westchester. A car would have been easier, but a cab to take them was unreasonably expensive and not much faster. It felt strange meeting Miles in street clothes, but it wasn't like they could take the subway as their alter-egos.
Matt wore jeans for the Saturday along with a Henley shirt and hoodie, though it was all hidden under his jacket. Grey fingerless gloves helped keep his hands warm wrapped around his cane. Turning his head as he heard Miles' heartbeat, he wondered if the teen was as excited and nervous as he was. This could be both really amazing or really awful.
With a good alibi to his parents for his absence and his costume under his clothes (just in case), Miles swiped his metro card to pass the turnstile into the subway station. He recognized Matt's face immediately and couldn't hide his smile as he headed over to him. Miles clearly felt this was going to be more great than awful. "Hey. 'Sup?"
"You ready for an adventure?" Matt asked, taking a sip of his latte from the subway coffee shop. He didn't have his costume on, but he had his mask in a pocket and his cane turned into his billy club. Useful, that.
"Word. Nice threads. Good idea to pose as a blind man. It'll look a lot less weird for me and you to travel together. I should've thought about something like that."
Matt smirked, debating whether to tell the truth or not. "Oh yeah, great cover," he echoed, too amused. Heading to the platform and the train, Matt slipped headphones on and listened to a book on his iPod for the train ride north.
One subway, one commuter train, and one taxi later . . .
Paying the cabbie, Matt paused outside taking everything in. The smell of the air, the sounds. This was not the city anymore. "You ready to do this then?"
It was almost too much green. But holy crap at that house. It was like something straight out of that silly British show that Miles's mom and abuela together watched every week. And he might get a chance to live in it? It was almost too good to be true. He nodded at Matt and walked up the lot with him to the front door. "Aren't you going to take that off now?" he asked as he rang the bell.
The door to the mansion swung open with an ominous creak revealing tall man wearing, would you believe it, sunglasses too. "Matt Murdock and Miles Morales?" he asked stepping outside to give the departing taxi a quick glance. "We've been expecting you."
"Yeah, that's not at all creepy," Miles muttered.
"We are," Matt agreed, resisting the urge to make a smart remark. This was why he was the grown up. "You must be Scott, Warren said he told you we were coming," he offered his hand for a handshake.
"Scott Summers," Scott introduced himself shaking Matt's proffered hand and nodding at Miles, "Welcome to Xavier's. So Warren's told you about the place?"
"Only a little," Miles replied. "Safe place for people like us, great teachers, good high schools nearby so I can lie to my parents about what I'm really here for. Standard stuff."
"Excellent, sounds like he hit all the basic points then," Scott acknowledged with a smile, "So, where would you like to start? It's a little cold outside right now, but as you can see the mansion comes with fairly extensive grounds, we even have some woodland and a quarry. Plus our own lake and boathouse for when the weather warms up."
Matt didn't say anything about the grounds, "Reasonably secluded," he agreed, trying to push his hearing as far as he could. There were very different sounds here than in the city. "Let's start inside then. I'm curious about what sort of powers you have experience with and training to use them," Given possible registration and the general feeling towards mutants, Matt wondered about how they did that.
"Sounds good to me," Scott stepped back inside waiting for the younger men to catch up, "We're pretty experienced with most varieties of powers. We've been doing this a while and have had people pass through with powers all over the spectrum, energy manipulators, physical mutations, enhanced senses even the odd psychic or two." Scott paused and looked at the others, "This isn't the way we normally do these tours, but I guess we can start from the basement and work our way up," that way they could end in the kitchen, that was always a high point. Stepping to the side the X-man pressed a button disguised in the wall revealing an elevator, "After you?" he offered indicating the newly revealed life.
Ooh, fancy. Miles stepped inside and leaned against the wall as the other men joined him. "This place is been around for a while, then? How long have you been teaching here?"
"All my life, I'm 37 now and I arrived when I was your age, I was one of the first students here," Scott allowed slipping off his glasses, "I came back and took up a position here after university, and have been here ever since. With the odd sabbatical or two."
Matt assumed he meant Miles' age and not his own or that wouldn't be quite so impressive. "How is it that people haven't figured out what you do?" He asked, surprised at how long they'd been around. "I assume some mutants have physical mutations?" Like Warren.
"They do, some mutants are entirely recognizable as mutants while others are. But honestly, if you didn't know him, would you have guessed Warren is a mutant?" he asked rhetorically, "A lot of people can get by without too much effort, and for those who can't, we have image transducers. Some of the tech heads cobbled together some holographic watches, without specialized equipment or extraordinary senses you wouldn't even realize that what you were seeing is an illusion."
The elevator dinged when they reached the right floor, and the doors opened to reveal what Miles could only describe as OOH SHINY. It was like an Apple store but better. "Wow. What classes do you teach down here?"
"The best classes of all," Scott replied opening a door and ushering the younger men inside just in time for a fireball to woosh up against the window to the room overlooking a large cave-like room. "We teach powers stuff down here, out of the way so no one can stumble across people training." He gestured out of the window, "Welcome to the Danger Room, something like a holochamber from Star Trek. We can create any scenario in here, and so can use it to train any combination of powers. Teamwork, control, everything, everyone who stays at the mansion is taught to control their powers, and then we can expand the training regimen from there if they want."
"Holochamber?" Matt repeated, interested, but also amused. He'd be able to see through a hologram. "Sounds interesting. Teamwork makes me think you've got some extracurriculars similar to ours," he assumed Warren had explained how they'd all met. "Am I understanding you correctly?"
If Warren's pitch hadn't been enough for Miles, then the Enterprise Holodeck Except Real and in the Basement sure sealed the deal. "Warren wasn't kidding," he finally said after several moments of wide-eyed astonishment. "Do we even need the rest of the tour now? What can you do, Mister S? If that's not rude to ask."
"I thought that might sell it," Scott allowed with a smile, the danger room was always the high point of a tour, "Well the truth is," he looked around conspiratorially, "I'm Superman. Well not really, more of just the eye blasts part of it," he confided. "It's not rude, I mean our powers are why we're here after all." He nodded at Matt, "We have a team that's similar to what you used to do." he allowed, "Like you we try to intervene in situations that let us save people's lives, wherever and whoever they are."
"And day jobs?" Matt asked, thinking of his own. He had no problems learning about his powers and other mutations or working as a team, but he wasn't giving up his career either, "I'm a lawyer and I can't just quit to do this," not when he just passed his bar exam and needed to establish his credentials.
"We all need to earn money and do something with ourselves," Scott allowed with a nod, "several of us work at the local school, or have jobs working in the city or nearby. There are no shortage of organizations affiliated with us who need workers if that's what you want, or if you have a job already. We're sort of somewhere between a hostel and a block of apartments. Everyone has a suite they might share, but then we all gather together to do things together like a baseball game or barbecue on the weekends. It's nice to have somewhere where you can relax and not worry about being a mutant."
Miles held up a hand. "Espera. Did you just say you have a team? I know you guys! You totally saved me from getting killed a few months ago." Matt seemed confused so he continued. "I was looking into the murder of this mutant guy in Brooklyn. Jumbo Carnation. Big fat gay fashion designer. Thought it was a hate crime y los puercos weren't doing anything about it. Turned out to just be a gang hit and I would've eaten it if a couple of other mutants who were also investigating didn't show up in the nick of time. I don't really remember anything besides them saying they're mutant good guys who do this stuff all the time. It must have been you guys." The astonishing coincidence made Miles laugh. This was fate, he was sure of it.
The worked for Matt, though the commute even on a good day would be a bitch. Maybe he could telecommute or just come to the school on the weekends and see how things went before he moved? It had taken them a good hour if not slightly more to get here now. "I remember that," Matt replied, "I wasn't there, Brooklyn's a little far for me, but I remember the case in the newspaper," that is, it made a tiny perfunctory list of recent crimes the paper put out each day. "Well, Mr. Summers, you have our interest."
"Well," Scott glanced down at his watch before looking over at the two young men, "It's almost lunchtime so why don't we head upto the kitchen and see what's on the menu today?" he asked, "We do tend to have pretty good meals most days, and then after lunch I can show you around the suites and the rest of the mansion."
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