Angel and Miles || Monday Afternoon

[x-firestar.livejournal.com]

Angel offers Miles a job - of sorts.



"Looked good in there," Angel told Miles with a grin as he walked out of the Danger Room. She hadn't been kind either, throwing everything at him that she could from the control booth. "Hey, before you change you got a minute? Wanna talk to you about something."

Miles had already removed the top of his Gen X training uniform before Angel spoke, so desperate he was to get out of that uncomfortable thing. The question mildly startled him. They didn't interact much outside of training, and as far as he knew, he'd been doing great with everything so far. Was he screwing something up that concerned her?

"Uh, sure," he answered, his voice wavering a bit with concern for his future prospects.

"It's not about this," Angel assured him quickly, waving a hand at the danger room. "Just a question. You uh...you do all the Twitter stuff for Worthington, right?"

"Oh. Uh, yeah. He has an Insta, too. He won't let me make him a SnapChat, though, but that's probably a good thing because ugh you know exactly what he'd put on it. Although he might get stuff in return . . ." Miles shook his head and had the good sense to look at least a little embarrassed for having said that out loud.

"Yeah please don't give him a SnapChat." Angel shuddered. "But good, perfect. So you know how all the social media stuff works. See, I have this...project I'm working on. And I know next to nothing about social media so I was hoping I could get your help with it. The the problem is it's not really something you'll be able to put on your resume or...really tell other people about."

Miles raised an eyebrow questioningly. "It's not illegal, is it? Because . . . actually, who am I kidding, that wouldn't necessarily be bad a thing. What is it?"

"It's not illegal," Angel confirmed. "Questionable, but not illegal. Basically...I'm starting a mutant friendly newspaper. I have someone working on making an untraceable Twitter account, and I was wondering if you'd be interested in running that for me."

"A mutant-friendly paper? What, like a zine? That's so old school. Why, though?"

Angel had to smile a bit at that. "Because if you watch the news there's not a lot of positive mutant news. Or even factually accurate news when it comes right down to it. And no one else is doing anything to combat that so I figured I might as well."

"What kinda stuff are you going to write about? Who's the audience? Are you actually going to print stuff or just publish online?" All that time around Peter when he was complaining about the Bugle was paying off.

Angel was definitely amused and impressed. "Audience is both mutants and anyone who wants to be educated. Content will be a combination of the mutant hate crimes the regular news doesn't see fit to report - or report correctly - and right now just in print - I've already got all the equipment and everything - but I'm gonna talk to my tech-y friends about setting up a website as well."

"You'll reach a whole lot more people with the Internet than paper," Miles advised. "Who even reads the newspaper anymore? That'd also make tweeting easier, 'cause then you can just link to the article. You just gotta make sure you're not gonna get doxxed for being a pro-mutant site. I can see the Reddit posts already."

"Hey, give me a break," Angel teased. "I just started this a month ago. I'm just trying to figure out who I can go to for help. And by the way, people still read papers. My dad wouldn't have a job if they didn't."

"Yeah, but like, zines. But maybe the hipsters stay hard copy because it's the retro thing to do. Anyway, just saying, if you want to reach past New York City, then you gotta go online. But I can totally do it. Social media. It sounds really neat, actually."

"Like I said, online reach is next." Angel grinned. "But great, perfect. Still working on getting it set up, I'll let you know all the information as soon as I have it."

"You know, I'm thinking," Miles started, looking as thoughtful as the Rodin sculpture, "You gotta make sure you have positive stuff, too, not just the bad stuff that the mainstream doesn't cover. There's mutant music groups and fashion and stuff you can cover. There was that designer last year, Jumbo Carnation, who was doing all this great mutant clothing. We could highlight people like him."

"Yeah, absolutely," Angel agreed. "That'll take a bit more legwork though, finding people who are willing to let themselves be put in a newspaper and online as mutants."

Miles nodded thoughtfully. "If they're in the business of making stuff for mutants then they should be happy for the exposure, right? You're hitting the right niche for them. And you've gotta have something more than just 'Here's all the people who were beat up or kicked out of their homes or killed today.'"

"Like I said, it's in the plans," Angel said. "Just a matter of what happens when you run out of the people who are willing to have the exposure. But we can cross that bridge when we get to it."

"Oh! And cartoons. Bet you could publish some mutant-centered webcomics or political cartoons."

Angel laughed at that. "We'll look into it."