Owner	Pose
Clarice Ferguson	It was Clarice's day off from her Brotherhood duties - and she was spending it concentrating on her homework. At the moment, she was stretched out on her stomach near the pond, lying on the grass with a book, a highlighter, and her phone. Periodically the young woman pauses, propping the book up as she searches up a specific word on her phone - not to find the meaning, but to learn the pronunciation. She still struggled with sounding out some of the more complex words. The word in question, this time, was 'brochure.' She rolls her eyes at the ridiculousness of the English language - why wasn't the 'ch' read as a 'ch'? - before she continues reading, turning the page - and sipping idly from a thermos sitting beside her.
Tommy Shepherd	It's not every day that Tommy makes himself known on Asteroid M. In fact, despite having his own private quarters here... he's basically never been here. Busy, he'd say. Things to do. People to meet.     But really he's just been hiding. Licking his metaphorical wounds after the horrors he'd experienced while imprisoned. And there really hadn't been room in that for supporting the Brotherhood's mission, whatever it may be. Tommy's really not up on the specific details.     He's not above raiding the cafeteria's buffet, though. That's where he's coming from, and his backpack is definitely stuffed to the gills with ill-gotten gains because he's having to cart his textbooks and notes around in his arms instead. He finds a place in the garden to do just about the exact same as Clarice is doing, though his focus on his phone is more because he's in some dumb internet argument at the moment.
Clarice Ferguson	"B- benig?" Clarice mutters quietly to herself, the magenta-hued mutant wearing a puzzled expression on her features. That's not a word... "Be-nig-n?" Definitely not a word. After typing it out on her phone, it reads out for her, 'benign.' "Oh, come //on//!" she protests. "That's not even remotely how it- English is stupid!" She shoves a bookmark into her book, and pushes herself up to a seated permission to glare at her phone, as if it has personally betrayed her in some way. This is ridiculous.     After running her hand through her equally vibrant hair, she looks up to find Tommy sitting nearby, and she offers a slightly distracted smile by way of greeting.
Tommy Shepherd	Tommy's fingers are a blur against his phone's screen. Like, literally. He's tapping so fast that there's no distinctive individual sound to accompany each letter he types, just a steady brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr sort of noise.     Trolls wish they could, but they got nothing on Tommy Shepherd.     Eventually though he tosses his phone onto the grass and flops backwards, legs and arms akimbo. "You're tellin' me. I gotta write a thousand words on Shakespeare's sonnets and none of them make any sense! Dude literally made up words and we're just supposed to be chill with that?!" He turns his head to look over. "It's stupid," he agrees, after a long pause.     And then he squints up at the dome overhead. Far, far overhead. "This is making me sick. Feels like I'm going to fall out into space."
Clarice Ferguson	"I've heard of Shakespeare," Clarice comments in a slow, hesitant voice. "...but I'm not ready to read any of his stuff yet, I don't think. I mean - I suppose Lydia would tell me if she thought I was."     She lets her head tilt back to look up at the view her eyebrows cocking befoe she remarks, "...really? I mean. I'm pretty fond of the view up here. I love looking down towards Genosha. Being able to look down on home - and know that it's safe, and still rebuilding every day."
Tommy Shepherd	"Old English dude who thought he was the shit, as far as I can tell," is Tommy's summation of the great bard's skills. He pushes himself back up into a sit and sort of sways, woozily, with the motion. Yeah, no, no more stargazing for him.     Tommy folds his legs together and considers the textbooks scattered around himself, the carefully labelled notebooks for each of his classes, his scavenged school supplies. "You're not missing much, anyway. More useful things to read. Poetry's never going to save your life."     He almost hazards another glance upwards, chin tilting thataway, but he manages to arrest the motion and force himself to look back down. He pulls his backpack towards him and unzips the main compartment, fishing out a plastic ziplock. Filled with fried spring rolls from the buffet. "That makes sense," he says as he fishes one out with a pair of disposable chopsticks that he'd saved, because he doesn't want to get greasy fingerprints on his things. "I guess I'd care more if there was something down there that I considered home," he admits, before taking a chomping bite. Speedster metabolism is a hell of a thing.     And because he is prickly and distrusting but not actually a bad person, he opens the ziploc bag up a little bit more and offers it to Clarice, if she's feelin' snackish.
Clarice Ferguson	"Genosha can be a home for all of mutant kind," Clarice points out, with an encouraging smile. "It's your home if you want it to be." Never mind that it was the site of a horrific genocidal slaughter in the very recent past. She tries not to linger on that too often - bad memories and all.     "Oh, thanks!" she adds as she spring rolls are offered - and she reaches in to claim one, simply using her fingers. After all, she can wipe them clean on the grass.     "But Genosha's been my home most of my life. It's... had a complicated, and sometimes troubled history, but I believe firmly in Magneto and Lorna's Genosha. A welcoming haven for our kind - free of prejudice."
Tommy Shepherd	The whole conceptual idea of "home" earns nothing more than a wrinkle of Tommy's nose. "Can't relate." He starts to kick off one of his shoes, pressing toes against the heel - the sole showing signs of melting, edges gone weirdly wavy - before he seems to think better of it, and folds his legs back under himself instead.     "I like to stay on the move, anyway. Hard to do that on an island," or an asteroid, "So it's fine, anyway. That's... good, though. That you have somewhere."     After a moment (ages) Tommy seems to come to a consensus with himself, and despite those previous words sounding unsure, he looks certain as he nods at Clarice. Supportive, even. Really, good kid, once you get past all the... everything else.     "I'm Tommy." He doesn't offer his hand, but he did offer his spring rolls, and that's just as good isn't it?
Clarice Ferguson	"Clarice," she offers in return - flashing the man a broad smile. "Nice to meet you, Tommy." She nods towards Genosha as she adds, "I didn't really have a concept of 'home' for all of my life either, you know," she remarks. "Hell. I didn't have much of a concept of self for part of it - but no one wants a sob story like that, on first meeting. It's good to have a place to call your own, though. Doesn't need to tether you."
Tommy Shepherd	Still not buying in on the whole "home" thing it seems. Tommy shuffles around some loose papers, sorting them into neat piles that get just about immediately ruined by his superspeed, sending them fluttering and back into nearly the exact same sort of chaos-based pattern around him in the grass.     "People need places to hold their stuff, I guess," seems to be as much as he's willing to acknowledge homes being a good or useful thing.     The next ziploc bag that makes an appearance is filled with... man, that is a lot of popcorn shrimp. He probably cleared out the whole platter from the buffet.
Clarice Ferguson	"I'm not much of a collector of stuff," Clarice replies in an amused tone. "Though - I do have some clothes. And some personal equipment. ...and a couple of photo albums now. Like... physical ones. Not just digital ones." Which is weird, but true. She takes a drink from her thermos, and watches the papers fluttering about.     "And really - I think of Genosha as my home, but I spend most of my time up here. The Asteroid, and the Brotherhood keep me pretty busy."
Tommy Shepherd	Half the popcorn shrimp are gone within about ten seconds. But Tommy only looks like he's sitting there chewing on one bite, which he does with the kind of casual boredom of someone who eats to live versus lives to eat. Not to say that he doesn't sometimes enjoy his food, but man does it suck having to keep up with his caloric requirements sometimes.     "S'possed to have stuff. That's what the world wants you to do. Grind yourself down into dust 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. for a couple of bucks then take that cash and spend it on garbage you don't need." He sniffs. "It's better not to get attached to things. Double fingers up at the Man, or whatever. I dunno." His fingers dive into the messy hair at the back of his head, a match to the rest of it with the whole unfortunately windswept thing he's got going on, and Tommy's silent.     For a long time. A long time for him, though, which to Clarice is probably only long enough for her heart to beat once. "If you need any help," he tells her, voice catching on his hesitancy, "With your homework. Just lemme know, okay? I gotta finish writing this essay."     And then his nose is in a book, a dog-eared copy whose worn-down cover proclaims to contain "All the Sonnets of Shakespeare". The pages turn rapidly.
Clarice Ferguson	"Oh," Clarice remarks in surprise. "I, uhh... I appreciate that," she offers with a small smile. "My homework probably wouldn't be much of a challenge to you, anyways. I only started my school a few years back now. I had an unorthodoxed childhood."     Enslavement. She had enslavement for most of her childhood. It puts a damper on academic goals.     "I wouldn't want to distract you too much from your own work, though. I just need to read a few more chapters, and answer a few comprehension questions, and put down a few new words I learned... that sort of thing, you know?"
Tommy Shepherd	"I'm done," Tommy says, and five previously blank pages of paper scattered around him are now filled with neat handwriting.     He sets the book down on top of the stack with the rest of his school texts, and then he rests his face against his balled up fists. "I wrote some BS about how having kids in this economy is morally bankrupt even though Willy's like," yes he's suddenly very familiar with ol' Shakespeare, "'Time's gonna fuck you up so you might as well pump out a few spawn to ensure your genetic legacy' or something," and he totally did finger quotes there despite there being no chance that's an actual direct quote, "Added some crap about as mutants our genetic legacy is like a ticking timebomb. Really thread all the themes together, y'know, and get some sympathy points from the teacher. Play up the sad mutie angle. They love that."     He throws himself backwards into the grass with a whump, eyes squeezed shut so he doesn't look out into space, or down at the Earth. "I missed half of junior high and basically all of high school. Don't worry, I get it. It's tough."
Clarice Ferguson	"...yeah. Guess a lot of us have had it tough," Clarice agrees. She never went to school... at all. She was 17 by the time she was rescued - but they don't have to whip it out and measure their trauma in some sort of sick contest. "Wish I could do my homework that fact, though," she adds in an amused tone.     "I better concentrate on my work, though. If I have any more questions about the words, though... I'll ask you."     After giving him a grateful smile, she turns back to her reading, her mouth moving slowly as she sounds out the words. She's a painfully slow reading - especially from a speedster's perspective.     Life in the slow lane.
Tommy Shepherd	Eventually Tommy works his way through the rest of the food he'd squirreled away from the buffet in his backpack. Who knows why he was unwilling to eat all that in the cafeteria, but totally willing to do so out here.     Then he falls asleep with a book spread out across his face like a blindfold.