xp_logs | Marie-Ange and Manuel, the art room, today late morning, early afternoon

Looking for a quiet place to relax, Manuel retreats to the Art classroom, and instead finds Marie-Ange painting. She offers to give him the reading she promised earlier, and he accepts though the idea scares him. As always, the results are more than a bit vague - about trust, and honor and revenge, and Angie gives herself quite the nasty headache. As usual.

Marie-Ange brushed a wisp of hair from her face and peered at the canvas in front of her. The last of the series of small paintings for Art class, and her favorite one to work on, because of the subject matter. She hummed quietly to herself - the same little tune she'd been humming for the last two days, and returned to painting.

Manuel, desperate for a place that wasn't infused with stress or other bad feelings, opened the door to the Art room and closed it behind him without checking first to see if anyone else was in the room. Sighing, he rested his head against the wood of the door for a second before turning around.

Marie-Ange didn't even notice the intrusion, intent on finding the -exact- mix of paints to match the sandy blond color of her subject's hair. It was damned hard to do working from a photograph. She continued to hum happily, occasionally singing in what had to be some kind of nonsense language.

Manuel turned around, reveling in the emptiness and comparative stress-free nature of the Art room - except for the one French redhead busy painting in the back corner, humming nonsense to herself. ~Shit.~ he swore to himself softly in Castillian, and turned around to reach for the doorknob.

At the noise, Marie-Ange's head shot up, surprised. "Manuel? What on earth are you doing here? I thought you went on your trip after all?" She set her paintbrush down on the easel, and wiped her fingers clean with a rag.

"I just got back. I don't want to talk about it. I just wanted somewhere where I could be alone for a while. The Gym's occupied, as is the Pool. My room is a bad choice right now, so I thought that no-one would be here. I will leave." he said with real fatigue.

"Alone? In this mansion?" Marie-Ange shook her head. "Good luck. Even the sunroom has become overly popular of late." She looked over him carefully, noting the exhaustion on his face, and tension in his posture. "Is there something I can do to help? You look horrible." She mulled over the deal they had made Friday, and considered re-offering, then held her tongue, unsure if it would help, or just make him irate. Manuel was -so- hard to predict sometimes.

Manuel let out another long breath, then shrugged. "I am never alone, and right now, that's part of the problem. I need to get away, or something to distract me from ... things."

"I could do that reading..." The offer was made tentatively, in a quiet voice. "I did say that I would.. " For a moment, Marie-Ange frowned in confusion, not sure what Manuel meant, and then remembered the link he and Amanda shared. "I am not quite sure if that will help though."

Manuel shrugged again. "It's not much, but it will have to do. I'd rather think about it than _her_." he says with real feeling in his voice. "So what do I need to do?"

"First, _I_ have to get this paint off my hands." Marie-Ange answered. "Otherwise it will get all over the cards, and for all I know, a smear on the cards might -mean- something. Everything else seems to lately." She headed to the sink and scrubbed the lingering colors off her hands, then grabbed a towel and dried them while walking to a table containing photographs, a sketchpad, and her cards, all spread out seemingly randomly.

Manuel just sat and waited for Marie-Ange to finish her preparations. "I have an appointment this afternoon, but I should be clear for the next hour or so. Will that be enough time for you to do ... that?" he says, despite himself the fear levels in his voice rising.

"An hour should be more than enough time." Marie-Ange began gathering up the cards from their places on the table. "Manuel, none of this.. " She let out a sigh, deciding halfway through speaking that it was probably not any use. Manuel was stubborn, and even if she could hear the fear in his voice, she was certain he wouldn't back out, and that no words she could say would reassure him. Instead, she silently shuffled the cards, finally placing them on the table in a neat stack. "Normally, I am supposed to get the person I am doing the reading for to shuffle the cards. If you want to, you can. If not, I am almost certain it is not necessary.."

Manuel scooped up the cards and began to shuffle them with an ease that spoke of long practice with shuffling. Even the cards larger-than-normal size didn't deter him much. "Just let me know when I have shuffled them enough." he said as he arced the cards through a bridge before shuffling them again.

Marie-Ange chuckled at Manuel's display, despite herself. Someday, she would have to get him to show her how to do that bridge. "It is.. an instinct. Stop whenever you like."

Manuel stared off into the distance with a thousand-yard stare, then after a few more shuffles stopped and placed the now-thoroughly-randomized pile before Marie-Ange. "Will this give me more nightmares?" he asked quietly.

"I should hope not." Marie-Ange said, after several moments of stunned silence. "Unless you've broken your damper?" She picked up the cards, and thought for a moment, trying to decide on a spread. Her usual favorite didn't seem appropriate.

Manuel looked to his left wrist and the ring of scar tissue, then to his right, where the dampener now sat. "No, it's fine." he said quietly. "Just - get this over with. You know how I feel about your power."

"I am rather unfond of yours, so consider it mutual." Marie-Ange shut her eyes, and tried to think, to bring up the mirror-her, which seemed to be the key to actively choosing to use her precognition. In her head, she began counting slowly as she placed the cards on the table, face-down in a rough pyramid.

Manuel quirked his head as he stared at Marie-Ange. "That's still really disturbing." he commented to no one as he watched Marie-Ange. "Even as fuzzed as I am, that can't be a good thing."

When Marie-Ange got to ten in her head, she opened her eyes, and set down the rest of the cards. "Well, that's new." she said, quietly, completely having missed Manuel's commentary. She began turning over the cards on the bottom row slowly, setting her jaw against the slight throb of a headache already starting to form.

"What?" he asked, panic already starting to leak out into his voice. "What's new?"

"I haven't used this spread often." Marie-Ange answered. "I have a favorite, this is not it. This is most definitely -not- it. Too many cards, and it is far too complicated."

Manuel waited for Marie-Ange to explain what the cards all meant, tapping his foot against the floor absently.

Marie-Ange finished turning over the cards, and then, on a whim, - and with a wince of pain - drew three more, setting them to the side. As she looked over the cards, she swore quietly under her breath as she recognized several right away.

Manuel looked at the spread, noting that some of them, from his perspective, were the right-way up for him to look at them. "Very pretty." he snarked. "So what does it mean?"

Marie-Ange frowned down at the cards. "That one, is a woman who has hurt you badly, with some sort of weapon, though that is not always literal. Words, and minds can be as sharp as swords. The next is death, which has come up for you before, quite literally." She winced again as she touched the two cards, both having personal meaning to her.

Manuel was astute enough to catch that flash of recognition. "You know more." he said accusingly. "Tell me more."

"Death is not supposed to be literal, and yet, it has come up for you and Nathan both, just before you nearly died." Marie-Ange said quietly. "As for the other, the first reading I did, it came up, as someone who would harm Doug, and then later as someone who would harm me. I doubt it is a coincidence. I am not sure I believe in coincidence anymore."

Manuel made one of the leaps of logic for which he was so usually castigated. "Kwannon?" he asked quietly. "Could that be her? I cannot think of any female who would wish you both harm, unless you've both managed to piss off Monet again."

"Kwannon." Marie-Ange confirmed, definite distaste in her voice. "Which, I suppose explains the card above it as well." She pointed to the card in question, one of the ones facing Manuel. "Symbolically, it is .. an enigma, or a mystery, or something you do not understand that can harm or frighten you." She frowned. "It is also the card I use for myself in personal readings."

Manuel blanched at that, but held his tongue. Clearly, he didn't like that piece of revelation One Bit.

Marie-Ange wasn't exactly happy about it either, even if it made a terrible lot of sense. She pointed to the two other cards on the bottom row. "These.. well, I suppose this one is conflict, and you do have quite a lot of that. The other... " She frowned, and shut her eyes, wincing. "Well, the other I should have guessed. He told me about it, so I am not surprised."

Manuel looked at the aforementioned cards. "What? Tell me - I asked for this. What does this have to do with the girl we saw?"

"I have no idea. It is .. Doug’s card, so perhaps whatever he was looking for on those computers had to do with her? He said something about hospitals..." Marie-Ange sighed, and shut her eyes, trying to concentrate. Manuel was flustering her, probably not on purpose, but it was not helping her think.

Manuel sensed it, and then leaned back in his chair to give her more room. "I will stop asking questions. I just want to know."

It took counting to ten in French, and then Latin, English and Spanish, and then French twice more before Marie-Ange could keep the meditation exercise image in her head without it fading away or changing. Once she could hold it in place she tried to open her eyes, only to squeeze them back shut as a sharp pain stabbed through her left eye. She carefully opened her other eye, the one that wasn't screaming at her, and looked over the cards on the table.

Manuel waited for her to elaborate what the cards all meant. His foot continued to tap against the floor.

Still grimacing in pain, Marie-Ange touched the card in the center of the pyramid, a woman, surrounded by swords. "Amanda will be in the middle of -everything-." She then pointed to the card to the left, and then the card above those, which showed a hand, holding a single sword. "It is all about who you can and cannot trust."

Manuel's foot stopped tapping as his jaw dropped.

"You are going to be wrong about who is and is not honorable." she said, touching first, the Knight of Cups, which had been placed reversed, and then her own card, The High Priestess, and then the reversed Ace of Swords again.

Marie-Ange let out a slow breath. "Revenge will be yours, and it may be satisfying to your palate, but will turn sour if anyone sees it. " She pointed to one of the cards placed to the side, Justice, but again, reversed, and then one of the bottom row cards, showing a group of young men fighting with pole arms.

"That much I have already figured out." he grunted. "Life is supremely unfair to me."

"The court, queens, and knights, and rooks and bishops will show you your lessons." Marie-Ange grimaced against the pulsing pain in her head, and touched three cards in succession. First, a card showing a regal looking woman on a throne, then a card showing a heart, pierced by three swords, and last, once again, the Ace of swords.

Before she could continue, she clutched at her head, whimpering, and slammed her hand down on the table, knocking away the bottom row of cards, pushing Death atop the reversed Queen of Swords, and nearly shoving both the Knight of Cups and the Five of Wands into the card above them.

Manuel watched all of this happen with amazement. But he managed to hold his tongue. He just looked at the stack of cards and didn't say a word.

In a hoarse whisper, Marie-Ange finished. "Last, your mother's daughter, born of another, will soothe the vast rent in your heart. Do nothing to lose her trust.." With a shaky gesture, she covered the topmost card, a hand holding a cup, water spilling over its rim, with her hand.

"My mother's daughter? My mother is dead. How can this be?" he said, clearly confused.

Marie-Ange put her head down on the table, and closed her eyes. "There are threads, and a tiny needle, and then a boy dies, because he cannot live without pain, and it tears the girl up on the inside, but she will survive without him, because she cannot be aware yet."

Manuel stepped away from the table, looking at Marie-Ange with a growing expression of horror. "What have you done?" he asked, the fear blatantly obvious in his voice. "What the hell _ARE_ you?"

Hot tears, from pain and anger at Manuel's outburst pricked at Marie-Ange's eyes, and she squeezed them further shut to keep from losing her already damaged grip on her self-control. "I .. do not understand what you mean." she finally whispered.

"When you do that, to my sight, it is like you went insane. I know what insanity looks like." he said, absolutely seriously. "It is like if your feelings were a sheet of glass, someone tossed a rock through it."

"It feels like someone put a hot rock through my -eye-." Marie-Ange responded, eyes still closed. "If I look insane to you, I am not surprised. It hurts to do this."

"It isn't natural. Well, mutation isn't natural, but that's _really_ not natural." he babbled.

"It is for me." Marie-Ange said, and sat up from her slumped-against-the-table position. "I cannot make it work any other way." Her face was pale and her eyes were still squeezed shut, fighting against her headache.

"If it was natural, then why the pain?" he asked. "Natural things shouldn't hurt."

Marie-Ange laughed coldly. "You are obviously male. Ask Amanda about that the next time she has her.. ah... what is the term in English? her period?"

Manuel managed to look completely disgusted and totally annoyed at the same time. "Why yes, I am, thank you ever so much for noticing. Didn't recall any complaints at the time..." he leered.

Marie-Ange managed to roll her eyes, even while leaving them closed. "Menstrual cramps hurt, Manuel. Every month, and they are perfectly natural. For that matter, so do plenty of other things that are natural." She winced, and clutched at her temple. "Including my precognition. Now, if you do not mind, I think I am going to go find an aspirin, or perhaps Doug and a pillow, or maybe all three."

"Enjoy." he said, without a trace of his usual sarcasm. "Someone's due home soon and I need to talk to her. Badly." And then he turned to head out of the Art classroom.