Keep Your Expectations To Yourself.

"What? No. Damn I'm not sure how to tell you this."

Rachel ran a hand through her hair. She had meant every word she said before, Shiori was going to be allowed to step out and wouldn't be forced to do anything she doesn't want to. As Rachel said, she herself didn't tell her own parents who she was for as long as she could hide it.

"Body swapped." That was not an answer that Shiori had been expecting, and she'd seen some pretty fucked-up shit. Of course, she would have known if she'd even dedicate any time to speaking with her mother, but their relationship was still too tainted to feel remotely close to being normal. Maybe it would never be.

"Yeah." A nod of the head and then: "You know, I could take you along for the day, if you ever want that experience."

Granted, she didn't know if she could see Shiori do that whole song and dance five days a week, hours at a time without getting bored. Even so, it felt wrong to deprive her new friend of the chance to at least experience something she hadn't before.

Something that wasn't 'please put the pointy thing in that person's abdomen'.

"Would they even let me in? Don't those places kind of have... security or something?" It seemed too good to be true for them to let Shiori wander around the building as if she belonged there, without even checking her credentials. Still, if she could get away with it, she wouldn't say no.

Then it dawned on her that if there could be a thrill with getting away with it.

"Stranger things did happen indeed," she quipped, mixing the ingredients as Shiori brought them to her, musing on where to take the conversation. "I'd say it's not as much as distancing you from yourself, than learning how to be your own friend. Saying compliments about yourself as a joke, instead of self-deprecating jokes, maybe? I heard it was a good start."

Using her TK, Rachel started to pour the batter into the pan so that it would show the shape of the Fibonacci spiral on the cooked pancake. It was fairly easy, even if Rachel was more about using brute TK force than refined control.

"Oh, don't mistake me. I don't hate myself. I'm pretty fucking great. I just also know the shit I'm capable of." It was Shiori's self-awareness that left her in a confusing place, because she didn't know how to change it. Or if she even wanted to. Because she pretty much believed that there was nothing wrong with her.

"You look like you've practiced that before. Or is this just a lucky first try?" While the pancake started to cook, Shiori quickly checked a few cupboards to see if any of them held any chocolate chips. No luck.

((template from @stephysource​: here))

independent, medium activity levels, non-selective. SHIORI. mutant OC and child of Kwannon/Psylocke. an exercise in finding out where one fits in a world where there are expectations to be met and disappointment to harvest. purely headcanon based; betrayal, depression and self-destruction will run rampant here; never turn your back.

The roll of the eyes is not lost on Mary, she can spot that kind of behavior from a mile away. She doesn't comment on it by choice.

"I don't know your mother, now, do I? Little mouse?" she asks, considering the teenager for a moment. "And we are not our parents sins, or faults, or whatever you want to call it. Your choices are yours, and you may have been somewhat shaped by their hand, you can take matters in your own and learn to be different."

She smiles. "You have not killed anyone? Then we have common ground already. I too can make people wish they were dead, but I never delivered a killing blow."

"I wouldn't know. Every mutant I've met knows or has heard of her, so it's become something easy to assume." Every time Shiori thought she found someone she could confide in, they ended up having some ties to her mother. The last thing she needed was someone reporting back to her about what Shiori had been up to.

Of course, this woman could still be lying about not knowing Kwannon, a way of weaseling more information out of her.

"She had no involvement in my upbringing. Thankfully. Or I would probably be even worse than I already am." Worse in what way, she wasn't sure. She just knew she didn't want to follow in her footsteps.

"Not that...?" It sounds like a question. It's not meant to be one. Dark brown doe eyes slide downwards. Trained now, as they are, on Shiori's cracked knuckles. "I mean, I'll stop and redirect that, um, energy. Into something else. Something productive."

Shiori had meant her threat as a joke, of course, but she still had trouble working on the tone of the joke for other people to get it. It seemed she was still failing at it so far.

"She isn't. Look, even if talking to your mom might be something you might want to do someday... Even I didn't tell my parents who I was when I first met them. Took me years to open up to them."

She tilted her head and considered the younger woman. A girl, really. Not so different from Rachel when she landed on this earth.

"Betsy and I are big on self-determination and agency. We won't push you or force you to do things you're not ready for." She wasn't sure how to phrase her next sentiment though.

Shiori had heard that song and dance before, but underneath it all, they'd all tried to sway her one way or the other. 'Shiori don't do that, Shiori don't do this, shouldn't you think about how others will be affected by your actions?' Ever since then, she'd become jaded by any offer of "letting her have her agency." Because everything came with a price.

"A special bond what now?" If she'd known this Betsy woman had some connection to her mother, she would have never suggested it. But it was too late to back out now. That would make her look like a coward.