Owner	Pose
Phoebe Beacon	"The Workshop" used to be an extension of the makeshift medbay in the North Concourse, but has slowly become a place of caffination and magicial workings as Phoebe had taken it over, accompanied occasionally by others in search of wisdom, solace, madness or coffee. After the Angels had a run on Grand Central Station, Phoebe had been missing, having decended into the subway tunnels on a supply run to get some objects that were hidden away for a rainy day.     Which is why she is currently speaking in ancient Khemet to a worn (but oddly magical) pink pegasus plushie, which has been hooked up with its own (empty) Starbucks Cup. She's wearing a sleeveless hoodie cut to her midriff, and wide, airy harem-style pants for maximum airflow. Her burns and scars along her arms are clearly visible, but the agonizing pins at least have been removed.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia had taken over the other corner of The Workshop, working on her own side projects as well as what they've come to term The Great Seal. The spellwork is finally finished on the thing, with little time to spare, and Lydia has been spending her nights sneaking out to inscribe the circles at the eleven locations needed. Slow and careful work if she was to succeed unnoticed. During the early evenings, when people are actually out and about, she's ensconced in the Workshop to work on other, helpful projects, as well as some pet projects of her own. One of them happened to be something for Phoebe. "So tell me what you think," she says, turning around and holding up a piece of paper for Phoebe to view. On it is a magic circle with odd geometric shapes whose angles just /don't/ add up. How does she /do/ that? Flaring off of the circle are a pair of owls wings, spread wide to catch the air. "I've got the ink mixed up. Just need a tattoo gun."
Phoebe Beacon	Phoebe had mostly been working on trying to fine-tune circles for effects. She gives a soft huff a moment, leaning back as she looks at the circles she has etched onto the whiteboard she was using for figuring the work out.     And she turns to Lydia, asking a question in ancient Egyptian, and then she shakes her head a moment and she looks at the angles of the circle, narrowing her eyes a moment as she begins to compute what the effect is supposed to do -- and then the circle flares. She gives a soft cry in surprise, and her head tilts a moment as she looks at the wings splaying out.     "... ohmigod. Lydia -- those are beautiful!" she exclaims, reaching out to poke at the wings.     "-- just need the tattoo gun?" she pauses a moment, the brain ticking over "... I thought you couldn't be buried in a Jewish cemetary with tattoos?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lyida laughs brightly, "This isn't for me. I can already fly. This is for /you/. Besides," she says, her voice turning a bit somber, "I don't know how Jewish I am going to be after all of this. I mean, I will /always/ be Jewish, because it's more than just a religion. It's a culture, and ethnicity, and that I can't just jettison." She shakes her head, "But it's hard to come away from this believing in a largely uncaring God when my patron Goddess actually /talks/ to me." "But, yes," she says turning the conversation back to the circle. "I can tattoo this on your back. I had some scrap orichalcum laying around after forging the spikes we need for The Great Seal, so I had the smith powder it." She gives Phoebe a wide grin, "Mix it in with tattoo ink and it because a magical superconductor. Just pump a little bit of energy in it and *fwoomp!* Wings!"
Phoebe Beacon	"Could be worse. There's no gods or goddesses that talk to me." Phoebe comments with a shrug. "Except Sandalphon. I wonder if it's true that he used to be Ezekiel." she gives a small smile, rubbing the back of her neck "I mean, wings are cool... OK yes wings are cool and yeah kind of want them..." she gives a little smile, rubbing the back of her neck and she breathes out. "So now we have superconducting tattoo ink and you want to set those on my back? -- what color's the ink?" she asks, and she goes to the worn leather bag, and she pulls out a tattoo gun.     Same tattoo gun that she did Sara Pezzini's ink with.     Same tattoo gun that was used on her own left wrist. She picked it up from the wreckage at The Laughing Magician.
Lydia Dietrich	"It's black, but the orichalcum gives it this kind of pearlescent sheen to it," Lydia answers. She starts digging around her workspace and pulls out a sizable bottle of the ink. "Here," she says handing it over. "It's really quite pretty if you hold it up to the light. I think it'd look pretty cool as a tattoo." She leans back in her chair and watches at Phoebe examine the bottle, "If you decide to go for it, I'll have to give you and Jon flying lessons. Well," she admits, "for Jon it's more like /landing/ lessons. Last time he did it he nearly broke his neck."
Phoebe Beacon	"As much as I'd like to think I can survive such an injury -- we can make sure there's some crash pads hanging about." Phoebs comments as she looks to Lydia, and then looks around them at the workshop.     "Thank you, by the way -- for watching out for our work. I'm sorry I wasn't there to help..."
Lydia Dietrich	"Think nothing of it," Lydia says with a shake of her head. "I'm just glad that in the end it wasn't necessary. We can't all be here all the time. You've got a life /outside/ of this place, regardless of how little time you have to live it." "We can rent a gym out for a time," she says thoughtfully. "Or just break into one since there isn't anybody about. I'd also be there to catch you."
Phoebe Beacon	Phoebe gives the ink a swirl, and she lifts it to view it carefully, turning it this way and that in the light. She purses her lips a moment.     "I should have been here. I'm one of the leaders. I was off chasing a phantom." she mutters crossly, mostly to herself, and she takes a deep breath, and begins to assemble the tattoo gun, slowly.     "I do hope that Mystique didn't find my lack of handshake insulting... I was already pretty nervous. The idea of touching anyone was making my skin crawl." she admits quietly.
Lydia Dietrich	"Jon was here. I was here." Lydia watches Phoebe with sympathetic golden eyes. "I'm no leader, mind you, but I like to think myself capable in a pinch. You can't be everywhere at once. You and Jon both let the weight of the world weigh on your conscience. I keep telling him that even he needs a break once in a while. Being stressed about everything 24/7 ultimately does more harm than good." "She wasn't insulted," Lydia says after a moment. "Especially after I told her that you were touch adverse. She's had people not accept her handshake for more insulting reasons, so she's gotten used to it."
Phoebe Beacon	"The weight *is* on my shoulders." Phoebe points out, "If... if I had been stronger... if I'd been able to see it instead of wallowing in self-pity and thinking everyone hated me, maybe I would have seen it. I could have caught that something was off... anything. I lived with the man for five months, you'd think you know a guy..." Phoebe trails off a moment, losing her train of thought.     "Yeah... I didn't used to be this way. You get to be pretty touch averse after being beaten to death. Terrible way to test someone's healing ability." Phoebe states dryly as she pulls off the cut-up hoodie, and is down to a sports bra with an X-back.     "... just so you know to the point I'm trusting you to do this.
Lydia Dietrich	"You weren't the only one close to him who didn't see it," Lydia says, rooting around her workspace for some nitrile gloves. Even though she's probably the most sterile person in the building, it's better to not take any chances. Once she's got them on she takes out a felt tip marker and brings her chair up to Phoebe's back. "People who hurt hide their hurt to keep other people from worrying. I've done it. You've done it. Jon does it." She holds up the paper, suspending it in the air with her little motes of light and starts to draw on Phoebe's back. If she's going to mess up at first she'd rather do it with ink that isn't quite so permanent. "You can't keep drowning yourself with 'what ifs' and 'if onlys'. I did it when I was turned. It ate me up at night... morning. You get the idea." She's silent for a moment as she finishes up copying the drawing of the circle on her friend's back. Even with normal ink, once the circle is complete she can feel it weakly thrum to life. "Sometimes," she says quietly, more to herself than Phoebe, "you have to let go and accept what happened." She blinks and says, louder, "When this is done and we've fixed the world, I'm holding a ceremony. I'm going to do a ritualistic burning of the past. Letting go the things that hold me back from moving on and accepting my life as it is. You're welcome to join me and participate, if you like."
Phoebe Beacon	"But you're not an exorcist by birth, Lydia." Phoebe points out quietly, "I'm supposed to be *better*. I'm the last of them."     Phoebe is quiet for a few heartbeats, chewing on words and what ifs and counterpoints that all seemed to selfish to say, and she looks at all the work around them as she crosses her arms over the back of the chair.     "... if we let go and accept what happens, then why are we fighting to change anything? Let go of Chas and accept that Jon's done for and leave Geraldine and Agnes with the same pain? I can't do that to them. That's a cut that doesn't heal. Ever." Phoebe whispers quietly.     And she pitches her head forward. "I'll go in support. I'm only seventeen, how much of my past can I really 'give up'?" she jokes.
Lydia Dietrich	"'Accepting what happened' doesn't mean 'accepting the status quo,'" Lydia counters. She slides back her chair to eye the work now that she's done marking it out and nods in satisfaction. "You can accept that things went wrong, or that you made a mistake, or any number of things, but that acceptance doesn't mean complacency. You learn from these things so that in the future you can prevent them, not flagellate yourself over them." She starts filling the little reservoir in the tattoo gun with the shimmery ink. "Granted I /suck/ at this myself, but my dad says this is how you move forward and better yourself, and it sounds like wise advice, and he's a pretty smart man. The point is, what happened in the past is done and over with. Unless you can time travel (which I admit is a possibility) you can't change it. What you /can/ change is the present and the future." Now she starts tattooing in earnest. The little buzz of the gun fills the air as she makes the first few strokes on Phoebe's back. "Having said that I'll be /damned/ if I let Chas stay a door. Jon dying, however, I think is necessary. /He/ thinks it's necessary. I think he's planning on holding a meeting so we can explain everything to everyone at once, but let me just say that we have a plan. Jon's not going to /stay/ dead."
Phoebe Beacon	"I know. I had to get some outside help to ah... help stave off Agnes getting the Archive powers before Jon's down for good--" Phoebe gives a soft sound of discomfort as the needle starts injecting the ink. The good thing is that Phoebe's already healing -- just every nerve's lit up at once.     She does, however, keep a biting remark to herself.     "Chas is aware of most of this. Sandalphon told me that he thinks about what's going on down here often, with just a thought he sees us -- I got to move my shoulder a little." she pauses, adjusts, and then settles again, scratching at the irritated, angry scars on her left shoulder.     "Sandalphon seems to think we'll beat Michael. He looked over my plans for how to pause the Archive from passing and made a few suggestions." she comments.     "Jon won't stay dead. Even if I have to go to Duat myself... he seems to think that there's something that can be corrected from that side." she considers. And she closes her eyes, listening to the buzzing of the tattoo gun.     "Yeah, no. I'm not letting Chas go, or Jon stay dead, completely out of the question. Unfortunately Jon's death is part of the game, that's not negotiable. But we're getting Chas back. Maybe by Easter. I promised Easter."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia pauses as Phoebe adjusts herself into a more comfortable position, and then resumes work. "Okay, good," she says as she inks, "I was wondering what the plan was to stop that from happening. Good to know you're on it." She stops speaking for a moment as she gets to a rather tricky part, eventually speaking up again. "You'll have to go to Duat to help Jon," she says as she works. "A bunch of us will. The real trick is going to be making sure we all get along. There's going to be five of us, not including Jon. You, me, and Cael. Ms. Fairchild and one other that was told to me as the 'Champion of Freedom,' whoever that is. Isis showed me how to open a door to the Duat. It's surprisingly easy."
Phoebe Beacon	"Well, yeah. Last time I traveled into an afterlife I read an inscryption in Themysciran and went through a glowing, red door. Hard part was being dragged out after--" she stiffens a moment. Conversation gets weird.     "/Caitlin/ is coming? Isn't she kind of antagonist to us at right this moment?" Phoebe questions, and she gives a soft 'nnngg' sound, resignation. "With Jon and I in the underworld, we've got to pick out a couple of lieutenants to keep things up here running. Sara, likely. Blaze. 'Champion of Freedom' --" she gives a soft snort. "What a title. What kind of person is that going to be?" she asks with a sort of defeated sound.     "Why me. Gods don't speak to me. Not even the ones who I get my powers from speak to me. Even when I *asked* they didn't speak to me."
Lydia Dietrich	"Yeah," Lydia says wryly. "Hence my point about trying to make us all get along." When Phoebe stiffens, she immediately lifts the gun off the skin, to make sure the lines are perfect. "I have no idea who that Champion is supposed to be. I'm hoping Jon will have an idea, otherwise we'll have yet one /more/ thing on our plate to accomplish in so much time." "I ask myself the same thing, Phoebe, and gods /do/ speak to me," she says resuming her work. "Why me? I'm just an unemployed English teacher who writes smutty books on the side. How the hell did the fate of the world land on my shoulders? They won't tell me." She lets out a sigh, "at least I don't have to carry this burden alone." She lapses silent for a while as she works. One of the good things about being a vampire is that it gives you excellent sight and magnificent hand/eye coordination, so the work goes smoothly. Soon she starts singing a little bit to herself, a little ditty in Hebrew that has a steady work rhythm to it. As she sings, the sting of the needle eases, and makes the pain more bearable.
Phoebe Beacon	"... yeah. At least you have mentors to help you figure it out. All the voices of my ancestors are silent, now. All I have are the books." Phoebe replies quietly. And she looks over to the pink plush sporting its own Starbucks cup. "And the pegasus."     "... and you're not an unemployed English teacher. You can trace your lineage back through so many peoples who survived persecution for, like, ever, to Royalty. You took up magic and built a Golem. A freaking *Golem* in New York City, selflessly to defend other mutants. You put a giant target on your back and learned how to stitch up tears in the aether on the fly. And you write smutty books that people enjoy even the non-smutty aspect of, how cool is *that*?" Phoebe comments a moment, and then she goes quiet, trying to stay still. Pain didn't bother her anymore than cold did these days, but for different reasons. She listens to the work ditty, and tilting her head, she hums in counter-point, harmonizing.
Lydia Dietrich	"I know," says Lydia quietly after a while. "You're not the first person to tell me this. I've had Gods and archangels tell me this and yet my brain still tells me, 'just an English teacher.' Things keep being thrown at me and it keeps me off balance to the point to where I have sense of what's 'normal' anymore. When this is done, when the universe is saved, and Chas and Jon are back to their right places, I'm going on vacation. We should /all/ go on vacation, just... not together. No offense." "We're almost done here," she says after another interlude of silent work. "I'm going to spend that time with Mystique. I kind of proposed to her the other night. It... wasn't my intent, but in hindsight I did all the things that a proposal would do except ask the question."
Phoebe Beacon	"Yeah. Any time it comes up I'm always just the one who woke Wonder Woman up from a black magic nap, or I'm meant to die, or I'm nothing special. I should be fine with it... but I'm not."     And she gives a gentle sound of amusement at the idea of actually taking a vacation. "None taken, I'm sure by the time this is done everyone will hate me for reals; Vorpal's been threatening me with rabbit-holing me to a tropical island for a year now; there's always another crisis." Phoebe counters with a note of joking in her voice, and she looks out over the workshop.     "Congratulations are in order then. Many happy returns, I wish nothing but happiness for you both." Phoebe comments after a moment as she focuses elsewhere. Her fingers tap against her elbows a moment, unsure how to follow it up.     "It'll be on Asteroid M, I'm assuming?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia snorts, "Not if I can help it. Don't get me wrong, I love the place, but aside from the garden it's built like a bunker. To be honest, we really haven't put much more thought into it other than, 'yes this should happen sometime.' More pressing matters and all that. Why, want to be a bridesmaid?" Phoebe could hear the grin her voice. Before she can answer though, she'll feel the circle close and the *snap* of power when it thrums to life. "There," Lydia says, scooting the chair back to examine her work. "How does it feel?"
Phoebe Beacon	"You do *not* wa-" Phoebe begins, and she feels the closure, and the soft hum against her back. Lydia might be able to see how the dark opalesence of the ink turns against Phoebe's darker skin, and the ripple of a metallic rose-gold as her own magic imbues with the power.     "Oh. *Ooooh* does that feel /weird/." she mumbles to herself, sitting up slowly and rolling her head from side to side.     "It feels like I'm leaning against the happiest hornets nest."
Lydia Dietrich	"Ring girl, then," Lydia concludes, grinning mischievously. She scoots the chair further back to give Phoebe some room and says, "Okay. Put some power into it. Give yourself a bit of space. That should manifest your wings. If it works as designed it should feel like it /wants/ you to fly." ... "Which it does."
Phoebe Beacon	"I was about to say every event I've been to in the last two years has horrible things happen, I'd hate for my luck to ruin your day. Your wife might kill me."     PHoebe gives a wry smile, and she takes a couple of steps back. She takes a breath, and swallows down her nervousness, and she focuses on that new tattoo on her back as the last of it heals, holding the magical ink in her dermis as she imagines the symbol, the sacred geometry, and she pushes energy into the circle, a steady, controlled stream of magic. Her fingertips glow rose-gold as she does.
Lydia Dietrich	"Sooner or later that luck of yours has got to break," Lydia says, watching intently. "Besides, I pity anybody who'd be rude enough to interrupt my wedding." "If you're worried about shooting off into the ceiling I'll catch you before that happens," she says. "How does it feel?"
Phoebe Beacon	Phoebe has her arms out for balance, the ripple of the wings coming into being, and she looks to Lydia, and she gives a toothy grin.     "Like I'm gonna get all up in some angel's business with a surprise."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia laughs and claps in delight. "That's the spirit!" Her strange golden eyes wander over to the clock. "Crap. It's time for Jon's meeting. We better get going. We'll do some flight lessons afterward."