Owner	Pose
Clarice Ferguson	The portal opens onto what seems to be an unusually large entryway to an asteroid apartment. The fact is - this is Clarice and Cynthia's new apartment, with the wall torn down connecting two adjoining entry halls to make a large living room space. A pair of desks have already been put into place - a small one tucked into the corner where the second entry door once would have been - though it's now a solid wall. A larger desk sits opposite the door, to allow Clarice to manage her slowly increasing responsibilities in helping to run the Brotherhood.     Clarice, however, is on the floor with her tablet, the photo album she'd bought for Cynthia - and a roll of wrapping paper. She's watching a Youtube video on 'how to wrap a Christmas gift' - or had been before she opened the portal. It's still playing as Clarice closes the portal behind Lydia, and studies the woman in front of her. She holds a pair of scissors in her hand, and a crumpled bit of paper from a failed attempt at wrapping has been tossed into a corner somewhere.     "Are you alright? Do you need me to drop you straight onto Raven's bed?" she asks with some concern.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia slogs her way through the portal, looking worn out and tired. She chuckles at Clarice's offer but shakes her head. "As tempting as that is, no. I just had a ..." Lydia struggles to find an adequate adjective. Weird? Stressful? Exhausting? All of those things are true but all wrapped into one. ".. day. What a day." She moves over to where Clarice is sitting on the floor and sits down beside her. "I learned some things," she says. "Some very concerning things." She lets out a weary sigh and leans back on her hands. "You know that portal that opened up in the Bronx that I had to hold closed?" She had mentioned this one before. "Well, it turns out that kind of thing is happening /all over/ the city. We're not entirely sure /who's/ doing it but we need to be prepared in case it happens in Bushwick." Slowly she slides onto her back. "You remember that John Constantine fellow who talked crap about my Golen?" She chuckles, "Turns out he can put his money where his mouth is. I just spent the last half hour learning how to close them. It was /exhausting/, and that guy is even more of an asshole once you get to know him." Lydia lets out a long, drawn out sigh. "I need to make a report on this, and send it to the watch on what to look out for. If a tear happens in Bushwick I'm going to need to be notified /immediately/ so I can get there and close it."
Clarice Ferguson	"Yes...?" Clarice remarks uncertainly. Her attention is completely focused on Lydia now - a mix of concern and curiosity both present on her features. "Do you need some water, or tea, or... something? I can have the kitchen send something up?"     The scissors are set down before she asks, "What can these portals do when they open? Do you think my gifts would be helpful at all?" She sounds dubious. After all, Robert has 'portals' as well - but she doubts she could do anything to affect his.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia scowls as she gets her thoughts in order. "Tea would be great," she says staring up at the ceiling. The portals are tears between this plane and the astral plane," she explains. "So in the Bronx, angry spirits came out and possessed people and they all started attacking each other. Another one somebody ended up in the Fae, I think?" She shakes her head. "They were all talking at once and I didn't catch the details." She lets out another sigh. "It's one of those things where you'll know it if you see it. It's not really a portal but a... a /tear/ in the fabric of reality." She shakes her head. "Really nasty stuff."
Clarice Ferguson	Clarice pulls out her phone and, though texting is not her greatest skills, the message is simple enough. 'Pot of tea pls.' It isn't long because she gets a thumbs up response from the kitchen.     The perks of leadership.     "Okay. So if I think I see any tears in reality spilling out angry spirits - I call you," she surmises. "...does it look like where we went with Nicolai on the otherside? Will I recognize any similarities?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia purses her lips thoughtfully at the question. "Yes? Kind of? It's many things. It's a plane of mind and ideologies. It's got little other realms that we hear about like the Fae, and the Dreamlands, so if you step on over you /could/ encounter something like what we did before." She pulls herself up and rests on her elbows. "Not all of it is bad. It's..." she struggles to find the words, "The subconscious and the superconscious made real."
Clarice Ferguson	"Okay," Clarice replies - in the sort of tone that implies she doesn't //really// get it. But that she is trying to. "So... I mean, maybe you don't know this. But does it always open up to the part of the astral plane that's filled with angry ghosts? Or might it open up into a different part?" she asks. "What's causing the tears to open in the first place, and is there a way to stop it? Is it only happening on Earth? Or might it happen... up here on the Asteroid? Or other parts of the galaxy?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia shakes her head in the negative. "We don't know who's causing this. And by 'we' I mean me and a bunch of other magical type people," she explains. "We're fairly certain it's a 'who' and not a 'what' at this point in time, but we can't really figure out a pattern as to where the portals open up." Lydia groans as she sits back up, crosslegged. "It doesn't always end up going to the same place. A mother and her child ended up in the Fae, I believe, and there was another that ended up somewhere else." She looks pensive for a while. "I don't know if it's happening on other planets. I don't think so. Earth tends to be special because of things like this, I think." "I honestly don't know if something like that could end up here on the Asteroid," she says, biting her lower lip in thought. "I don't think so. There isn't that much magic up here, and there aren't enough people to really put much of a footprint in the astral plane." She reaches up and pinches the bridge of her nose. "And then /something/ is making all the gods of death fight each other, but I'm pretty sure that's so far beyond my abilities that I doubt I could do anything to help with that." She lets out a heavy sigh. "That reminds me. I need to talk to Raven about setting aside a small portion of our bandwidth to try to connect all us mages together. Spiritual threats are just as dangerous to mutants as they are to humans."
Clarice Ferguson	"Okay. I'm going to add 'all the gods of death are fighting each other' to the list of sentences I never expected to hear." Just how many gods death are there? Clarice's expression looks baffled, and concerned. But she pushes herself to her feet as she hears a knock at her door, and opens the door to retrieve a tray with a sealed thermos of tea, a few cups, sugar, cream, and even some lemon slices. She settles this near Lydia, as she pours two cups of tea.     "So - other than helping you get where you need to be to deal with this mess, and communicating the concern to the members of the Watch, what else can I do to help you with this, Lydia?"
Lydia Dietrich	"Oh, thank you," Lydia says, graciously accepting her cup of tea. She thinks about Clarice's request as she squeezes a slice of lemon in it, and stirs it around with her teaspoon. "Other than listen to me whine about how I'm in over my head in this mess?" she asks with a chuckle. "Just normal stuff that you already do. Make sure we have a teleporter around because I might need to go .... " she throws her hands up in the air, "God knows where to deal with this." She heaves a sigh and looks wearily at Clarice. "The more I learn about this stuff the more I'm convinced we need to find another mutant that has some magical talent on staff because sooner or later something out there is going to bite us in the butt and we should have more than just /me/ be there to cover it."
Clarice Ferguson	"I see," Clarice agrees in a thoughtful tone, frowning as she ponders who they could contact. "...There's Wanda?" she suggests. "I mean, she tends to be rather busy, working with the Avengers and all that. But she may be able to recommend others? Or we can ask Talia? I don't believe she has magical talents herself, but Wanda is her mother in her home reality, and she's been so so many different realities - she may have some idea of who else we could turn to or recruit."     While she's talking, she adds sugar to her, stirring it in to melt it before adding cream as well. "I think it'd definitely be a good idea to get you come backup of some kind. I'd hate for something to happen to you." She smiles a bit wryly as she adds, "Which honestly, now that I'm responsible for Cynthia - the possibility of something happening to one of us, or mostly something happening to me, has been a concern..."
Lydia Dietrich	The suggestion of the Scarlet Witch causes Lydia's head to bob in agreement. "She might know. There might be somebody out in Genosha, too. We'll just have to keep our eye out." She takes a tentative sip of her tea, and finding it not too hot, takes a more definitive sip. "We just all have to watch out for each other," Lydia says with a soft smile. "We're a team. We're a community. That's what we do. You don't have to be responsible for her alone."
Clarice Ferguson	"No, not alone, but- I //am// responsible for her," Clarice points out. "And that's how it has to be, yeah? Someone has to have the final say." She takes a sip of her tea before remarking quietly, "I asked Lorna if she'd be willing to be her legal guardian - if anything did happen to me before her 18th birthday. She said she'd need to think about it, which is fair. It's a big responsibility. But I just- I mean, not that I plan on doing anything stupid, but if anything ever did happen to me - I wouldn't want her to feel like she was orphaned again, you know? That she lost her //only// family. I hope I could count on you, and Raven, and maybe even Mister Creed, to make sure she knows she never has to be alone again. You know?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia gives Clarice a gentle smile, and reaches out to take her hand. "You've got it," she says. "As far as I'm concerned you're family. And if you're family, then /she's/ family too." "Now," she says, making a change of subject, "What have you been working on?"
Clarice Ferguson	"Good. Thank you." Clarice smiles at Lydia, squeezing the woman's hand in return. "And as I said, I plan on being around another good 80 years or so. But..." Just in case she wasn't.     She turns her attention to the mess in front of her, sipping her tea again before reaching up to set it on Cynthia's empty desk. "I wanted to wrap this and leave it on Cynthia's desk," she remarks. "But... wouldn't you know? I, uh - I haven't wrapped things before." She tends to give gift cards. It's //so much easier//.     "I can't figure how how to know how much paper to cut," she admits.
Lydia Dietrich	A tendril of ectoplasm takes the photo album from Cynthia's desk and floats it down before Lydia. "Come here. I'll show you." She unrolls a good length of wrapping paper, and sets the book a couple inches away from the edge. "So for something flat like this, I start here, a little bit away from the edge. Just eyeballing how much you'd need to pull it up and over the spine of the book." She demonstrates by doing just that. "Then you take the book, flip it onto it's other side like this," she says, rolling the book up onto the opposite side of the spine, "And then back down." Rolling it again, she lays it flat on the other side that she started with. "And then you give yourself a little extra room to make sure you have enough paper and that should be good enough to start."
Clarice Ferguson	"...oh," Clarice replies, watching as Lydia manipulates the book on top of the paper. "As easy as that, huh?" she asks a bit sheepishly. "So I just cut... here?" she asks, indicating above, and to the side of the book. Only when Lydia gives confirmation does she begin to cut the paper in need, smooth strokes. The scissors are new, and this quite sharp.     "Okay. So the video has me taping the paper down to the book, and folding the paper over it, and then, umm.... creasing the top and bottom somehow?"
Lydia Dietrich	"Right," Lydia says, confirming what Clarice has been told. "Let me show you." She reaches out and begins folding the paper, but doesn't tape it. "First you fold it like this," she says, "And then crease it here, and fold these over here." She works slowly, making clean crisp lines with the paper, like she had wrapped a hundred books as presents before. Which, knowing Lydia, wouldn't be that much of a stretch of imagination. "And then you tape it down here, and here, and then you're done!" She goes and unfolds the wrapping paper, and slides it and the book over to Clarice. "Now you try. Just follow the creases that I made."
Clarice Ferguson	"I appreciate this, Lydia," Clarice says with a wry smile. It's not quite embarrassment - but it's still akin to it. "There's so many things that people simply know that- somehow I never learned." Well. They both know exactly how, but Clarice has her attention focused down on the album, as she starts carefully pulling tape off the dispensor, and applying it to the paper to hold it in place over her gift, carefully following the creases Lydia helpfully made for her. "This isn't so hard as all that, I suppose."     With the gift wrapped, she finishes it off with a commerically produced box, pulling off the sticky paperto slap it into place.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia grins proudly as Clarice seems to get the hang of it pretty well. "You're making up for lost time, I know," she says. "And gift wrapping is a skill much like any other. Books and boxes are easy. It's when you come across things that are shaped differently than that do you have to get creative." She leans back on her hands and gives her friend a chuckle, "Of course the easiest solution to /that/ is to just put that thing in a box."
Clarice Ferguson	"Or stick to buying gift cards!" Clarice declares brightly. With Lydia's help, it's not doubt a better wrapping job than Clarice would have managed on her own as she sets the book on the desk, and reclaims her tear, relaxing on the floor of the living room with a quiet sigh.     "I just... I still don't understand the value of... /stuff/. I mean, other than that, really." She nods to where the other album sits - atop her own desk. The precious album with pictures of young Clarice and her family.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia shrugs, "That's nothing to be ashamed of. There's a lot of people out there who don't really hold a lot of attachment to /things/." She picks up her tea to take another sip. "They're just not sentimental people. You had your entire childhood taken away from you, so you never had the chance to really accumulate stuff or put emotional value to them." She grins, and bumps her shoulder against Clarice. "And there's nothing wrong with that." "That giant mug I got you, for example," she says. "When I was thinking about you, I didn't think you'd keep it around for sentimentality's sake. I think having a big ole cup like that would be useful to put things in. Like pens, or paperclips. And if it makes you smile thinking about it and what it means?" She lets out a little chuckle, "Well that's icing on the cake."
Clarice Ferguson	"A friend cared enough to give it to me," Clarice remarks. "It- somehow it seems wrong to just get rid of it. And besides. When I see it, I'm reminded that- It reminds me about just how much my friends, my family, care about me. Not just you, but Mister Creed and Mystique finding me and staying with me when I was confused and frightened."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia shoots Clarice a wide grin. "See? You really /do/ understand the value of stuff." She takes a sip of tea before she continues, "Sometimes we hold onto things because they remind us of our friends and loved ones. Sometimes they remind us of important times in our lives. You're just beginning to make those connections because for the first time you're having /good/ experiences that you want to remember."
Clarice Ferguson	Clarice nods, thought she still seems a little uncertain - and unconvinced. "Still - if anything happened to the mug, I wouldn't be very upset. The album though... I wonder if I should just have another copy made that I can keep around to look at. But give the original back to Cynthia, to hide it away and keep it safe." Losing that connection to her life with her parents, now that she had it? It would be devastating.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia considers this for a little while. "Hm. We should definitely scan your old photos so we have a digital copy of them in case something happens to the album itself," she muses. "And as long as we keep digital copies of those pictures your taking, we can recreate the album should something happen to it." She shakes her head and gives a little shrug. "The copies won't be the same as the original, granted, but at least you'll still have them."
Clarice Ferguson	"But Cynthia can keep the originals safe," Clarice points out. "As long I give them back to her, and just rely on the copies then- everything would be perfectly safe. I'm not sure if I'm just being paranoid or- or what. But it does feel like the best way to do things to me." She sips her drink again - letting out a contented 'mmm.' The tea was a good idea.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia shakes her head with a soft smile, "I don't think you're being paranoid, really. Especially not with what we have to deal with on a daily basis," she says with a roll of the eyes. "You have something valuable that you want to protect. It's only natural. "
Clarice Ferguson	"I supposed you're right. I mean - I'm lucky to have it at all. That Cynthia was able to protect it. I only remember a couple of the things in there, the rest of it, honestly the pictures might as well have been of someone else. Only they're obviously not. I'm a bit distinctive."     She takes a deep breath in, letting it out slowly before she adds, "I know it's pointless, but I still wish, if I could have anything, that I could have just one chance to talk to my parents."
Lydia Dietrich	"Just don't..." Lydia begins hesitantly... "ask me to try to find their spirits. It's not..." she winces at the internal conflict that's arisen. "It's aveirot. A transgression against God's will. I try not to bring my religion into things when it comes to you and Raven, but when it comes to something like this... it's a big deal for Jews. The dead remain dead, and their spirits rest in peace in whatever afterlife they deserve."
Clarice Ferguson	"Except that my mother was following me," Clarice offers in a small voice. "Nicolai saw. I- When I asked him to go to Genosha with me to look for them, he did something, and I saw her too. But I couldn't //hear//. He could, but I couldn't, and I can't- I don't remember what her voice sounds like. I wanted so badly to hear her voice..." She lets out a heavy sigh. "That's how I found out I had a sister at all. She said something, and Nicolai heard her, but I just- I assumed Cynthia was dead, too."     She smile sadly as she adds, "But I won't ask you to do something you don't believe in, Lydia, anymore than- well, than I'd ask Rahne to kill. They're gone, and there's no use wishing otherwise."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia nods sympathetically. "Not everybody has the same beliefs that I do and I try not to let it cloud my judgement of them." She chuckles, "I can't judge people on how good of a Jew they'd be if they're not Jewish, after all. Regardless," she says with a shake of her head, "I'm glad that you /did/ find Cynthia. You deserved this, to have living family. To not have /everything/ taken away from you."
Clarice Ferguson	"I don't know that deserved or didn't deserve matters," Clarice remarks quietly. "The child I was certainly didn't deserve any of what happened. My family didn't. But as I am now..."     What was it Raven had been telling her? That she needed to forgive and accept herself? She lets out a frustrated sigh. "I don't know." She starts tidying up the gift wrapping things - rolling up the paper and tucking it into a closet, throwing away the trash, and tucking the scissors and tape into her desk. When she reaches her desk, she lets her hand rest on the album as she adds, "I know your religion is important to you. And Rahne's to her. But I just don't see the point of them - or the truth of them."     Looking back to Lydia she asks, "Can you make it to Raven's room alright?" Not that it's far.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia drains the rest of her tea, and gets to her feet with a groan. "I can make it," she assures Clarice. "I'm going to sleep like a brick tonight." She starts shuffling her way out of the common area, "Goodnight, Clarice. I'll see you tomorrow."
Clarice Ferguson	Clarice moves towards Lydia to give her a brief hug as she adds, "I'll see if I can get ahold of Wanda and Talia. See you tomorrow," she promises - before seeing Lydia out of the room.