4332/Stranger Comparisons

Stranger Comparisons
Date of Scene:	07 December 2020
Location:	Central Park
Synopsis:	Noriko and Alyx run into each other in a food truck line. Nori ends up sharing her food with Alyx and they learn about some initial striking differences about their worlds relating to television, mutants, etc.
Cast of Characters:	Noriko Ashida, Alyx Vance

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Noriko Ashida has posed:
The air is frigid, the grounds of the park crunch from old snow under foot.  There's a full bright, nearly blinding moon out as well.  BUT THE FOOD TRUCKS DON'T STOP!  Even for aliens and natural disasters.  It was the smells that lured the speedster here.

Noriko isn't wearing the right clothing for the weather.  The girl seems to pop up from nowhere, stepping out of a shadow with jeans, sneakers, and something that looks like a thin windbreaker on or something.  It's second hand and is sporting lovely electric colors like a 90s mall grab, but the colors compliment her blue hair.  She does pull out some fingerless knitted gloves to put on as her eyes twitch across the menu when she gets around to the side that's serving.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    The frigid air had been a problem for Alyx Vance. Going home to escape it wasn't an option and her temporary lodging had some awkward strings attached. And so, she found herself in the outskirts of the park where the food trucks liked to park. Her grey hood was drawn over her head -- anything to keep warm -- and her hands were stuffed into her pockets. Even with her normal, non-speedster metabolism, the smell of the food trucks had been impossible to ignore as she walked by.

    "They don't have..." Alyx mutters, pausing only to recall the words. "...chili dogs." She says the words like they're unusual for her. The food truck gets a quizzical look, almost like she's trying to figure out if it's actually a food truck without chili dogs. As the other girl comes around to the serving side of the truck, Alyx watches her -- not with curiosity, no, but perhaps for a clue on what she ought to do next.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko's eyes snap to the worker inside and she takes a quick step forward.  She waits until she's spoken to and then begins, well, "2 chili cheese fries fully loaded.  2 large ..."  It goes on and on.  She holds her hands behind her, and at one point, there's a flicker of electricity that jumps between her fingers before she makes a fist a moment later.

When it comes time to pay, Noriko says, "Uh.  One second."  She shakes her hands out and reaches into her coat to pull out her wallet.  She keeps it low, which is probably a good thing, because the first bill goes up in flames in her hand which she stomps out quickly.

"Nothing.  It was nothing here," Noriko hands over the bill.  "Keep the chang...actually, she can use the change," she says, hooking a thumb over her shoulder.  "What do you want?" she asks as as she turns slightly to look back to Alyx.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    The order goes on and on and on, and as it does, Alyx's eyes dart around the displayed menu, trying to match Noriko's words with the pictures on the side of the truck. This goes on for a few moments before Alyx would find herself with a stranger's money but no idea how to spend it.

    "Well," Alyx begins. There's a pause. "...How about you decide?" She lifts her eyebrows and smiles at the stranger, giving a look that suggests that the ball had been returned to her court. The brief electrical display had gone unnoticed.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko waits and waits between the words.  It's not that Alyx takes forever.  No.  It's because Nori's mind is racing as she tries to devote more attention to staying in the moment and controlling her building charge.  She seems relieved to find that Alyx hasn't run away or looked at her with a burning hatred.  Maybe she didn't see?  Lucky.

"Two-choco-tacos!  You-can-pick-from-some-of-my-stuff. We're-going-to-need-dessert."  Some of the order is already coming out.  The loaded fries.  "We'll be back for the rest."  Noriko turns to hand one of the paper boats loaded with mouth treasure.  "My name's Noriko."  She has a the faintest trace of an accent.  Japanese if recognized.  She steps aside and motions for Alyx to follow, still facing her as she lifts a fry glob to her mouth and steps backwards without looking.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    "Two...choco-tacos," Alyx repeats, as if agreeing. She shrugs her shoulders and smiles. With little thought on the matter, Alyx follows Noriko, presumably to some nearby seating. She grabs a fist full of paper napkins as they pass a dispenser and raises her eyebrows as she watches Noriko move backwards. "I'm Alyx," she replies with a smile. While her voice lacks any notable accent, her features share some similarities with Noriko -- she's half Japanese and half African-American...in a way. "Thanks for sharing..."

    Suddenly, one of the napkins in her fist gets caught in a burst of chilled wind and separates. It dances briefly in the air before Alyx reaches out with her other hand -- the empty one -- and pulls it back, as if she just pulled at nothing. The napkin suddenly changes direction and flies right at Alyx's waiting hand. "Do you normally share your food with strangers in the park?" she wonders. "Not that I'm complaining." The business with the napkin is just passed off as not-a-big-deal-at-all!

Noriko Ashida has posed:
The napkin trick could just be an optical illusion, a coincidence, but the way Alyx reacts to the napkin precipitously working itself out isn't, and Noriko notices.  Damnit though doesn't she wish she was at speed to see what actually happened.  She frowns slightly at the thought.

There's some tables nearby, because it's not happenstance that there's a congregation of food trucks here.  Moooost of it is covered in pigeon crap, under and over a layer of snow.  Noriko kicks off a chunk of snow to check that doesn't look like it's been a victim.  Eureka!  Other side?  Yep.  It's at the end.

"No, but I don't feel like wolfing down alone and I'm about to be soooo bored.  After this I mean.  Do you normally eat strangers' food in the park?" she quips back with a smirk as she settles down, flopping her boat'o'fries down unceremoniously.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    Where food goes, pigeons tend to, so the concern was shared. Alyx extends a forearm and uses it to wipe away some of the snow from the table, following along with Noriko. With her forearm extended, the tops of Alyx's fingerless gloves are visible, revealing a hodgepodge of electronic components attached to the back. There's no attempt to hide this most unusual modification...

    "Well, this is my very first time in the park, so I'd say that, yes, I normally eat strangers' food in the park," Alyx answers with a wry smile before taking a seat. "So..." she begins. "...That was a nice little light show..." She HAD seen!

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko's a little busy devouring her fries while Alyx settles in.  Apparently, her stomach can wait for no one.  At least it allows her to pay a little more attention to her surroundings and Alyx rather than her bottomless pit.  But this is why she doesn't have time to ask about the strange hardware sprouting out of the back of Alyx's hand.

The little joke gets a small grin from the speedster.  Between moments, she snatches bites, not ever really having to miss a moment to eat, but it is still a disjointed existence.  To the average eye, she looks like she might be blipping like a bad livestream.

"Yeah.  Like how I can make twenty dollar bills poof?"  Noriko asks, deadpan.  "So what's up with your hardware hands?  Are you new in the city or something?  Or visiting?...Oh, my name's Noriko by the way," she tacks on quickly, more like she's speaking in fast forward than someone /trying/ to speak quickly.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    The first few blips go unnoticed, allowing Alyx a moment of peace where she can reach out to take one of the fries on the outskirts of the boat -- hey, Noriko offered! She pops it into her mouth and leaves it open so the fry can cool. By now, the blips had been seen and Noriko introduced herself a second time. Alyx blinks and begins chewing the fry.

    "Yup, I remember..." she says softly. "I'm still Alyx." She smiles, though her eyebrows rise a touch in response to the other girl's...difficulties.

    "These are my gloves," Alyx explains, moving her hands in the air for inspection. "Zero point energy manipulators. They're helpful... Yeah, you could say I'm just visiting -- Earth's nice but I'm not sure it feels like home, you know?"

    Another fry is stolen without shame. "Are you on drugs?" Alyx asks -- the words are filled with abject curiosity, as if she was fascinated or didn't know what 'drugs' did.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko realizes she's doing a crappy job of sharing when she notices Alyx reaching to snag a fry, so she makes the fry boat meet her.  It's just two centimeters.  She doesn't totally pull the rug out from the girl.

Then, yeah.  She knew she should have trusted her sense of deja vu.  Noriko outright blushes at Alyx's response.  "Oops."

And /then/...Well the gloves are explained, and what?  Noriko's eyes twitch open.  She's not even touching the fries anymore.  Her metal fingers are still all chilied up.  That's going to be a bitch to clean.  Old habits die hard, but Nori doesn't even notice.

"What do they do and am I going crazy?"  She checks her charge levels.  "Huh."  Her cheeks feel like fire again.  Power levels wouldn't explain it, but she's not sure they would anyways, unless she fried her own brain.  "Shit."  She certainly /seems/ like she's on drugs.  She shakes her head in a blur.

"I wish I was.  No.  I go fast.  It's actually kind of...an effort to stay, like this.  Here," as if other velocities were different worlds from this one.  "So where are you from exactly?"  Maybe she just misheard and had a tiny overreaction.  She's been known to jump the gun.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    "You go fast?" Alyx repeats, her eyebrows rising a bit. "Well, don't go slow for my benefit. Go however you want." Another fry is swiped before Alyx tilts her head to the side. She chews it thoughtfully and watches the other girl closely before holding out one of the napkins from earlier -- it might even be the one rescued from the air by the electronic circus on Alyx's gloves!

    But where was she from? "New Mojexico," she answers simply, talking with a fry in her mouth -- totally and utterly unashamed. "How about you?"

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko almost seems to visibly sigh with relief at Alyx's words.  Suddenly she's gone and back with the rest of the order.  It does take her more than a few seconds though, on account of having to interact with the food truck staff.  Still chilied up.  Leaving chili prints behind on those little boats of food she's laid out.  Two bottled waters.  "The problem is, if I don't.  I'm not really here with you either," she explains, picking right up where they left off.

"I have no clue where that is," but the fry-chatting makes Noriko grin.  She says nothing about it.  "I'm from Japan...actually, I was born here?  But, my parents, we went back to Japan after I was born so..."  She shrugs.  "Why did you come here?  What is New Mojexico like?"  Noriko plows through at least a fourth of the feast between moments before she slows down any.  "Sorry, my bellyache was killing me."

Alyx Vance has posed:
    "Holy..." Alyx says as Noriko seemingly disappears. Time seems to crawl, for one of them, anyway. Noriko's back in time for Alyx's second word. "...shit," she finishes, though the two words were said as part of the same sentence. Such is life when talking with speedsters. Alyx raises her eyebrows again before slooooowly reaching for another fry -- she really, really, really didn't want to accidentally collide with her new friend. "Why are you so fast?" Alyx asks with an appropriate curiosity. She does her best to answer the speedster's questions.

    "It's on Mojo World," Alyx answers. "...Mojoverse. The Wildways." She clarifies, going from specific to general. "Oh, Japan? My grandparents were from Japan, Earth -- my mother's parents," Alyx shares with a smile. As Noriko shifts back to New Mojexico, Alyx frowns a little. What's it like? Why was she here? "It sucks," she answers firmly.

    "And, I'm here to bring someone to justice. Or kill her." She says it all with no hesitation, as if she might be totally unconcerned with sharing.

    "So, you were born here, went to Japan, and then came back?" Alyx questions, watching Noriko closely. She could disappear at any moment.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko stops, hand frozen in the iar to let Alyx get her fry without trepidation.  "You don't have to move slow you know.  I won't hit you."  Why is she so fast.  Why is she so fast.  Her knees bounce, causing the table to vibrate.  "Um.  I'm a mutant, so it's just one of my powers.  My body can turn electricity into kinetic energy.  And other stuff."

"Oh," yeah she does nothing to hide her confused look, but doesn't pester Alyx about it.  Tries soooo hard.  Why are these moments so very long.  "Really?  Cool!...Not so cool.  Forget I asked then."  Oh but she wants to know, her conscience won't let her pursue it.  Or maybe it's WHAT ALYX JUST SAID.

"Huh.  What lady?"  Noriko just doesn't take her eyes off of Alyx.  Until that last question, which has her looking down and drawing in a deep breath.  She pulls a boat close and munches down on a chicken tender.  "I came back," she says almost as if it were a correction.  The emphasis is there, but there's no hubris behind it.  She seems stuck to her seat as if she has cement shoes.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    "A mutant!" Alyx repeats, her eyebrows rising again. The two words are spoken with a small bit of delight, almost as though it's being held back a bit. It certainly doesn't sound like Alyx has any issue with mutants, whatsoever. "How interesting. Mutants are really popular back home..."

    Alyx's eyes dart to the side as she follows an idea thread. "Electricity into kenetic energy..." she mutters softly, reaching out for a fry as she does. She seems to be working something out mentally. Whatever thought she had brings a satisfied smile before Alyx pops the fry into her mouth.

    "Well, there's someone here who needs to answer for her crimes, so, I'm here to find her. Personally, I'd prefer it not go so neatly, if you get my drift..." Alyx winks, smirks, and moves on.

    "So, you came back, but just you, then?" Alyx questions as she continues chewing the fry. "Sounds lonely."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko holds up her hands as if to signal to lower the volume.  She looks over her shoulder and into the shadows around them of the poorly lit areas.  "Well it's not like that here..."  Noriko doesn't expound.

"Yeah it's tied to my physiology.  So if I don't have enough charge, hello coma, etc.  Metabolism and healing rate are affected, but it's more like I just go through the healing or dying in fast forward.  It's dumb.  And the really fun ones?"  The sarcasm is dripping here.  "I absorb electricity passively without needing to have contact with the electrical source.  So...sorry if your phone is at ten percent or whatever.  Don't let me touch it, or cook, or," Noriko shrugs.  "And then I have to run off and discharge somewhere and kill a bunch of small animals and or crops.  And I don't sleep long because, well..and then I'm bored all the time.  I can't go swimming and often I'm too tired to take an actual shower in the morning because it takes too much effort and I always screw up.  Yeah, mutants are cool."  Somehow, perhaps it's the haunted look that emerges in her eyes, it's clear this is just the tip of some much deeper than inconveniences.  Her quickly rattling it all off definitely contributes to it.

"Yeah.  I'm not sure if I could kill someone intentionally," Noriko admits, as the subject matter seems to prompt the consideration in the girl's flitting mind.  "I've had the chance to...I mean not all the people."  Whatever that means.  "But I get it.  I wish messy things to some people at least.  Really hard."

"Yeah...but I'm not there."  Noriko looks down and grabs a fry quickly, at least a little closer to her natural speed, but there's a little pensive look and a flash of guilt.  With her at this speed, anything subtle but normally obvious comes across as a microexpression.  "I ran away," to another country.  "Then lived on the streets for awhile.  Finally ended up in some boarding school after a mishap."  She's glossing, like anyone does, making it all sound like it's no big deal. "What about you?"

Alyx Vance has posed:
    "Mmm, sorry," Alyx replies, glancing around as Noriko's hands suggest that she should keep her voice down. "I didn't realize -- mutants are great for ratings on Mojo World." Her tone suggests that she really hates something in that sentence, almost like she was repeating a detail she was forced to memorize.

    As the other girl describes her mutant powers and the trials of managing them, Alyx simply lets out a sigh. "Sounds exhausting..." she decides, studying Noriko for the moment. "I'm sorry you have to deal with all that." Alyx reaches out with her hand and uses it to push the fry boat closer to Noriko, signaling that she had enough and wasn't planning on going back for more.

    "What about me..." Alyx repeats, considering that for a moment. "Well, I was a television star back home." This is said with a small amount of shame. "...And now I'm not," she adds, almost cheerily. "We're working on freeing the people and making some long-lasting changes, but it takes a lot of effort. I'm part of a group working to overthrow a tyrant and end slavery. The one I'm after is part of it." For being as young as she is, Alyx Vance carries a heavy burden.

    "Did you ever think of maybe trying to find other..." Alyx begins, pausing a moment to lower the volume of her voice. "...mutants?" Normal volume resumes. "...One thing I've learned is that it's better to suffer in numbers if you have to suffer at all."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"It's cool.  It's not like I couldn't get away from whatever, but I'm sort of supposed to be keeping my powers on the down low."  Noriko wipes at her gauntlets, already internally bemoaning the full clean she'll have to do later.  Maybe Dr. McCoy will let her use a sonic cleaner.  Thoughts fly by.

"Yeah, but I don't need a car and I still haven't learned everything in the world," Noriko offers both to Alyx but more herself as a silver lining...well, tinsel maybe.  "What do you mean, like your TV ratings?  I don't know much about TV stuff other than watching."  Noriko seems to take take the signal in, because she devours the rest of those fries, and starts in on the rest of the food, her eyes stop motioning at Alyx in the moments that she stills.  Paying as much attention between bites as a human would.

"What's wrong?  Wanted to do film?"  This girl clearly has utterly no clue what Mojo World is.  When Alyx speaks of 'freeing' people, Noriko's brow furrows, lower lip jutting into a frown, but for once, she just listens, now still.

"I've met other mutants.  I didn't have much of a choice.  They helped me, as much as they can."  Noriko shrugs and drums her metal-sheathed fingers on the table, once, pinky to forefinger.  "Tell me about your gloves.  I'm studying ahead in sciences, but I haven't heard about anything about what you said.  I don't think."

Alyx Vance has posed:
"You're 'supposed' to keep them on the down-low?" Alyx repeats, tilting her head forward as she says it. "Says who?" Noriko's unfamiliarity with Mojo World and its customs is mirrored with Alyx's unfamiliarity with this one. Still, she sounds somewhat frustrated on Noriko's behalf -- Alyx really hates bullies.

    "Hey, at least there's that..." Alyx says with a smile, noting the optimism Noriko's offering in regards to not needing a car. "At least there's that."

    "Television is the single worst social structure in the world," Alyx says sternly. Her eyes rise to watch Noriko. "I was an actress for many years until I learned what was going on. That I was a slave." She shrugs her shoulders. "...But, like I said, the revolution is coming."

    The question about her gloves...Well...

    "Gravity Gloves," Alyx introduces, extending a hand over the table for the other girl to get a look. "They manipulate zero-point energy fields -- it's the energy between the subatomic particles in atoms. When done right..." She reaches her hand towards one of the choco-tacos that have gone untasted. The electronic doo-dads on the back of her gloves start to spring to life -- some LEDs illuminate, two small flaps at the knuckles open up, and.... Alyx pulls her hand back, as if yanking on something invisible.

    But! Instead of just one of the choco-tacos getting pulled towards Alyx's waiting hand, several different food items spring into the air! For an average human, it would mean a shower of napkins, fries, choco-tacos, drinks, and anything else that had been placed on the table. The items spring into the air and are destined to fall to the ground or, worse, onto Alyx herself...

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Alyx's inquiry into /who/ causes Nori to think of it differently, triggering not just the more recent instructions to her, but also another incident in another part of her life completely.  She blinks, and it takes her a long moment by normal standards to respond.  "The people who helped me with these.  Took me off the street."

Sensing the frustration in Alyx's voice, Noriko adds.  "I was doing fine, on my own," if you count a 13-17 year old managing her powers on the street in a foreign country with powerful illegal drugs.  "But they're right, at least about keeping my powers hidden if I don't need to use them."  She's obviously lucky that she can get away with the speed, but the whole thing is a double-edged sword with all the other obvious issues she has that give her away.

"I mean, in the last few months I was kidnapped twice.  I didn't need that to know I should keep my powers hidden though," suggesting other experiences.  She digs into the rest of the food rapidly, but dials the speed down when Alyx begins to speak, but in between the words, she's looking at the extended hand from all angles without getting too close to them.  Noriko knows some of the keywords, but she's not gotten to the point where she's gotten this far in penetrating the material.  It is high school stuff after all.  Basic forces and learning all the anatomical parts of various physics systems.

"Woah," Nori's eyes expand quickly and she waits, waits, waits to see if they fall.  And then she can't take it anymore.  Still in her velocity driven world, she flits to grab each item and puts it safely on the table.  Then she tries to return to her seat in the same position.  "Cool.  So like telekinesis?  But not with your mind?"

Finally Nori rounds back to the television thing, as if she was trying to avoid it at first, but it stalked her till she gave in.  "I don't get it.  We have television here and it is awesome.  People take the work they want or really what they can get, some of them get paid a lot, but the only people who force people to do things in front of cameras are tossed into prison.  Here in the U.S. it's weird.  Normal people judge other people's trials."

Alyx Vance has posed:
    "But /why/?" Alyx asks -- why keep her powers secret? It didn't make sense. "...I mean, I guess it's worth keeping them a secret so you don't have to join the cast of a show. Mutants are popular."

    From Alyx's perspective, the food items were thrown into the air and then.... were back in their rightful place. Her eyes lower to her glove, which she shakes out a little -- had something malfunctioned? No -- one of the choco-tacos was safely on the table but had been a little askew. It didn't take a rocket scientist to understand what had happened. "Thanks," she says with a smirk.

    "No, not telekinesis... More like..." Alyx stops once television is brought up again.

    "Woah, woah, woah, wait -- you have television here?" Alyx questions. She closes her eyes and sighs. Why had she not thought of this? Suddenly, Alyx's eyes widen and her head goes on a swivel. "Is this a show?" she asks with some intensity. After just a second or so, she takes a long, careful breath and shakes her head. "Of course not," Alyx decides. It would seem that television back home is bad news.

    Alyx takes another breath and rises from her seat. "I'm going to have to check this out," she explains. Television on Earth, that is. Alyx reaches into the pocket of her jeans and pulls out a cellphone -- it's the opposite of fancy. It's an off-brand smartphone type usually sold as a pre-paid item in convenience stores.

    "If you can figure out how to get my phone number from this thing, take it down and send me a message," she requests. "I have some glove modifications I'll be working on and I think your unique talents could be helpful to test them out..."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Because there's a lot of people who hate mutants."  Noriko's teachers might say they're afraid.  She wouldn't give them that slack though.  "They hurt them, experiment on them, torture, kill them."  But Nori knows that Alyx's questioning is a little more personal than that.  She wants /Nori's/ reasons, or at least Nori thinks so.

"I've seen mothers and fathers turn against their children, all their hatred, all their-"  Noriko takes a deep breath after having held it, but it continues on more shallowly, rapidly.  "It twists all their rage toward this /thing/ in their eyes.  They have to punish it, destroy it.  Or they have to fix it or...it doesn't even matter." Her eyes start to glow, little lightning storms start to dance chaotically with each other. She zips off and comes back in two seconds.  Her eyes are back to normal now.

"No this isn't a show.  This is real life.  There'd be a whole camera crew and lights and stuff it were a TV show.  There'd be trailers everywhere."  This, Nori has seen at least.  "I mean.  It's fake.  Even the reality stuff is all nonsense.  Documentaries are more realistic I guess on the whole spectrum of things," she rattles.  "I don't think you need to worry about whatever horrible thing acting is on your planet," because Nori really hasn't quite connected Mojo World acting with the whole slavery thing.  It's just so inconceivable, that it's like the two aren't being processed on the same wavelength in her mind.

"I shouldn't touch it.  I could fry it or drain the battery.  These are crappy temporary gauntlets," and she already had troubles with draining batteries before.  "You could just send me a message instead.  Do you know how to do that?  I can help you save it in your contacts book so you'll know it's me."  Noriko's brows arch at the opportunity, for what purpose, she doesn't care.  Alyx's gloves are cool and experiments mean anything can happen!  Right?  "That sounds cool."  Who even knows what they are!  Nori grins.

Alyx Vance has posed:
    Alyx takes a breath. "Yeah, well, people /love/ mutants back home," she repeats, frowning a little at that. The comment is left intentionally vague, but from the sound of it, it doesn't seem like a good thing to be loved in this context.

    When Noriko disappears, two seconds is long enough for Alyx to blink, dumbfounded, before her companion resurfaces. "...Alright..." she says, dragging the word out as she makes sense of the sudden appearance. Mutants were well-liked back home but this would take some getting used to.

    "Alright, I'll send you a message then," Alyx agrees with a nod. The contact information is exchanged, then, and Alyx slips the phone back into her pocket. "I've been looking into getting these to interact with the zero point energy fields created between energy sources and not just objects... But, more on that later," she adds.

    Alyx gives Noriko a mock salute. "Noriko," she repeats. "Thank you for sharing your food with me. Stay safe out there, huh?" It sounds like Earth is not as cushy and easy as she had been led to believe. And, with that, Alyx stuffs her hands into her jacket and is off!

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko, naturally, pretends like nothing happened, her eyes didn't get all glowy or anything and she was here the whole time.  Of course.  She provides her number.  "It might ring and then cut to voicemail.  I'm not ghosting you.  I probably ran into a snafu," she says with a less than thrilled wiggle of her fingers.

"Yeah, more on that later," Noriko parrots as she tries to put the building blocks of her learning to work without a pen and paper to deal with her utterly average working memory.  Later.

"Thanks for keeping me company," The loner finds herself saying, but brushes it off as insignificant.  "I will.  You too.  Don't bite it before we get to test the mods."  She waves and then checks her cash reserves, of which there are none, forgetting she burned her other twenty.  For this she decides to light her trash on fire with lightning bolts for a brief moment, snuffing them out before she draws attention.  Then she shoots back to Xavier's in the opposite direction.