THE REVOLUTION WILL BE TELEPATHIC

Ray stops walking for a bit when the scenery drastically changes, she’d never had anything happen like that to her before. Or maybe she had, if what Sinister had done to them was any sort of equivalent but she barely remembered that stuff. She looks around, but just as quickly as he does it, it fades away. When her eyes find his again, she smirks at his confusion. “Can’t wait til you do,” she says playfully, brushing past him. “Now come on, a girl needs sustenance if she gonna keep up flirtations.” 

Ray swats at his hand in annoyance for bopping her on the head but she kinda likes it. She never really got the chance to be familiar with anyone she wasn’t related to, or basically related to like Rachel. Given the amount of time they spent together, anyway. So it’s nice, establishing a different repertoire then she was used to. She lets herself be pulled along though she could easily pull back, grinning all the way. 

“Ah feel like it isn’t an’ you just keep tryna get me alone,” she accuses, swatting back at him as she crashes into his back when they’re nearly out of the alley.

“The fun thing about my mutation...” Quentin grinned, always loving to show off. “Is that I can be alone with whomever I please at any moment.” His voice echoed off the white walls of the large empty room they where now standing in. He continued to walk forward as if unfazed by the change of scenery before inevitably dropping the new girl back into reality. He did not, however, deny her accusation. 

“Huh.” His face wore a look of confusion again, realizing that he’d just been able to pull her into his mind despite being blind to hers. “I suppose not all of your mind is off limits. I’m going to get to the bottom of this eventually.”

Ray groans, of course he wouldn’t let that go. It wasn’t really a date, she knew that but it was the first word that came flying out of her stupid mouth. She ignores his wink, knowing that lead down a road to certainly not-good intentions. It’s easy to though because the next thing he spouts on about sounds like a lecture and if she wanted a lecture she’d be in school right now not fucking around in town with him. She glares at him rather than answer, barely suppressing the urge to kick his shins. 

“Be a gentleman, would ya?” she says with a light gasp at his suggestion, shoving at his arm playfully. Of course she had plenty of money, none of which were in her pockets. She knew better than to keep money where others could easily grab. But still, her daddy taught her exactly what to expect on dates should he ever allow her to have them and paying was not an expectation. 

“I’d say something about not believing in money and that money is a construct created by the capitalist bourgeois but this is a date.” Quentin winked at her. “Besides I’ve got mommy and daddy’s credit card.” He pulls out his wallet and bops her on the head with it. There was clear spite in his voice, not unlike the tone he’d have taken when ranting about Xavier’s compliance in mutant subjugation. 

“Wait. This way’s quicker.” He says, almost as if he’s realizing it for the first time himself, before pulling her into the next alley. 

Ray wonders if he knew who her mama was, would he be talking to her like that. The kind of temper she flared wasn’t one he wanted to stoke. Or maybe it was. “Ah’m plenty sure you wanted ta kill ‘im,” she hissed at him waiting til they passed an alleyway before shoving him in there. She points at him, said temper bubbling in her chest. “Ya ain’t gotta prove a damn thing to me, okay?” Her finger jabs at his chest and she is standing pretty tall for a small girl. “Maybe ah ain’t morally superior but ah’m not the one mind controllin’ people on a goddamn date.” Realizing what she’s said she shuts her mouth abruptly and looks like a deer in headlights before backing up and heading out the alley. 

“A date?” Quentin grinned wickedly. Any guilt he might have felt had disappeared. “Someone should have told me sooner. I might have actually taken that guy out. Much more romantic than mind control.” He winked. 

“Seriously, though. Even if I wanted to kill him, I wouldn’t have. It wouldn’t have helped the cause. If it’s just you watching than I don’t get any credit for it and if I did, what would it mean to the public? Some mutant kid accidentally killed a civilian? Just got angry and and took it out on a passer by? I’m not against killing but it kind of looses it’s impact if that’s all you’ve got going for you. I want to be seen as a threat, not a naughty school boy. Killing him would have been more naughty school boy than challenging a professor in class.”

Ray isn’t sure how she expected him to react to her taunting. But it certainly wasn’t this. So maybe those stories she read about were true, maybe he wasn’t someone she was supposed to be idolizing. Then why did his actions strike more than fear into her? Like a bolt of lightening from her constricting chest to between her legs. She flushes, for a myriad of reasons, and hisses his name. Looking around them, she finds that no one is paying attention to them. Like there’s a perception filter around them and she’s the only one full of an anxiety so palpable she’s sure he can taste it. And probably likes it.

“Stop,” she says firmly, and without hesitation she rips the gun from the man’s hand. She’d inherited her mother’s strength, and it was like batting a fly. So was crushing the gun with both palms, bullets and all bending beneath her incredible strength. She tosses the heap of metal to the ground. “Ya made your point.” The look she gives him isn’t pleasant as she shoves past him, eyes front and center as she continues on their path. Sure she enjoyed breaking the rules, but not at the danger of harming innocent people.

“Have I?” Quentin frowns. He looked at the man who’s hand was still raised to his head. “I don’t think so. We haven’t even done anything yet.” He looks back at Ray, her unease visible. He couldn’t help but grin a little. Sometimes he worried people didn’t take his threats seriously anymore. Leave. Quentin commands. Leave and forget everything. 

“No need to act morally superior. If I’d wanted to kill him you won’t have been the only one watching.” He told her as he caught up. 

“It’s been said,” Ray says with a nod as he calls her a pain in the ass. In fact it’d been said by Olivier not even a few hours ago. And Arlo yesterday. She listens to his theory with a smirk on her face wishing she could immortalize this moment. Quentin Quire trying to figure her out. “Ya close,” she lies with that same smirk quirking her mouth. “Ah’m actually the Marxist scholar and civil rights lawyer and ah’m a mother of twelve… Cats, that is. And they’ve all escaped here to avoid bath time.” She stops in front of him with a raised eyebrow. “Could ya really call y’self a rebel, ‘den? Looks to me you jus’ a naughty school boy.”

He wrinkled his nose at the insult. Naughty school boy, pft. He’d show her. “You know, it’s not always about active antagonization of your opponent. In certain case, civil disobedience is far more effective. Building up resistance is just as important, especially if you don’t have the numbers. But if you really want a show,” Quentin smirked. “I can always fudge the numbers.”

He looked around a moment, considering. If he was going to disrupt the peace, he may as well make it worth something. A man in a suit brushed by them but before he could hurry on his way, he stopped. Quentin had him turn around to face Ray. He looked sharp, too clean cut for this far out from the city. “What you you think about him?” Quentin asked. He pulled a out a pocket knife and handed it to the man. Without the slightest expression on his face he took it and brought it up to his own neck. 

“Don’t cha get it?” she says with a giggle, watching him join her in the air like she’d hoped he would. “I’m not tellin’ ya jack.” Abruptly dropping to the ground outside of the wall, she clasps her hands behind her back and begins walking away with her nose in the air. She loved how much it was pissing him off, being clueless and unable to solve this enigma he’d encountered. She loved being the mystery he wanted to solve. She hopes it keeps him up at night.

“Ugh. You’re a pain in the ass, you know that?” Quentin complained, rolling his eyes. “You don’t even have to tell me the truth but if you’re not talking this is going to be a pretty dull outing. Here I’ll start for you,” He squinted at her, hand holding his chin and pretending to think. “You’re the daughter of a Marxist scholar and a civil rights lawyer and you’ve come here to escape theory and make real impact only to realize that Xavier’s School is just as ideologically driven and somehow produces even less results. It would explain why you’d be so eager to run off with the first rebel to cross your path.”

It was exactly the kind of story Ray had expected, and one she wanted to hear more about when she wasn’t distracted by the sight of her long dead mother. She stares after her even after she’s disappeared, nearly missing what Quire says next. But he hears her name, her real name, and looks up. “Mr. LeBeau,” she repeats quietly. She’d yet to see her Daddy, which frustrated her to no end. She wanted to see him herself, see Olivier in him. Before the misery of losing her mother took hold.

“Don’ mind?” she teases, recovering quickly from her momentary stupor. She doesn’t take his hand, instead she lifts one foot off the ground and uses the one firmly planted to propel herself into the air. Floating high above him, she smirks down. “C’mon slow poke.”

❛ you need a cause, mavey. ❜ now it is his fathers voice that haunts his mind. stark is it’s comparison to his mother. the great king tiberias calore, sixth of his name. the all distracted and oblivious would have been a more fitting summation of his character. his father was a king who spoke of war as if he had a hunger for it, but he was too much of a coward to rid norta of it’s terrorists. his father was a failure ———— maybe it is in that pitiful epiphany where the two of them are similar. still, maven hates the sound of that stupid nickname. typically only used by cal, who shared shared his father’s name, the seventh. but maven can obviously still remember the way it left his lips, his mother leaving that memory to fester inside him. 

his father always something more of him. wanted him to find a purpose. because maven wasn’t like his brother. barbaric on a battlefield and warm with the eyes of his dead original lover, coriane. every time tiberias looked into maven’s eyes he would only see cold water. as if it was maven’s fault that he had his mother’s eyes, blue as the sky on a winter morning. and now here was this punk, someone who so obviously was trying to rebel against the society around him, because why else would he seek out an outsider ? someone who seemed like a fellow outcast in the grandest scheme of things. he knows the anger the boys feels very well. to brushed aside without a seconds hesitation. he knows just how badly it stings. but the miscalculated the kinship doesn’t stop the shit eating grin that forms on his face, though. it bleeds into existence like a cashmere cat out of thin air.

blue eyes size up the boys frame, holding back a scoff when the land again on the color of the boys hair. PURPOSE. what could this fool possibly know about purpose ? maven remembers carrying the weight of a country, a various personas and the weight of an incompetent brother. the former boy king crosses his hands into his lap and settles deeper into his chair. it is no throne, and the brute feeling of it beneath him makes him question how the hell silent stone could be more comfortable than this stupid chair. ❝ waste away ? ❞ his fingers come up to his mouth trying to hide his chuckle. ❝ what makes you think i’ve got any plans to stick around in this decrepit place? by the looks of it, you look in need of my help. so go on then, share with me this proposition.  ❞

Quentin had a split second to make a very serious decision. On top of that it was one he’d never favored. He’d never been an eavesdropper, at least not telepathically. He’d climb into another’s skin with disregard just to dance them around like a marionette but seeing other people’s memories was a different kind of invasion—more intimate. Whether it was self respect or self obsession that normally lead him away from this choice in this small moment it where he was staring down this boy’s smug expression.

Calm passed over Quentin as he returned Maven’s royal demeanor. “You’re world must have been incredible. Mutants subjugating humans, oh but you’ve got a whole different set of words don’t you? Silvers, reds, so silly. But then so is the idea of monarchies and you had plenty of those didn’t you? So many rules and so much disparity. Revolting.” He looked the young prince in his electric blue eyes; his next words were chosen carefully. “You’ve got no where to go, Maven. This isn’t you’re world, it’s mine. There’s no one between you and ‘your’ throne because there is no throne.” 

You’ve got a name for people like me don’t you? It’s a good one too. I must say I like it. He thought. But I think, oh yes. I’m certainly nothing like any that you’ve known. If that helps. 

If he wouldn’t drop it, that meant she’d be seeing more of him and she found she didn’t mind that at all. Her friends back home definitely wouldn’t believe her. Ray caught up to him easily, smiling. “How long ya been here ‘den?” Sure she knew about him through books but it was different to meet him in person, and she was trying so hard not to be too obviously interested in him lest this turn into some weird interview.

“Jus’ got here myself, me,” she offers, hooking her thumbs in the straps of her backpack. She had her portal watch tucked into the hidden pocket of her leggings’ waistband. Every time she stepped she felt it, and it reminded her she didn’t belong here and she shouldn’t get too comfortable. Who’d want to live in the past anyway? As the thought passes her mind she sees a flash of white stripe as Anna Marie power walks past them mumbling something or other in a tone that didn’t sound too happy. Ray watches her until she disappears, but keeps up with Quire. “Wonder what’s on her mind.”

“Just over four years.” Quentin answered, looking mischievous. “It was court ordered. My lawyer used the defense that ‘everything I did using my mutant powers could not be my fault as I was too young to have full control over them’ but I assure you everything I do has purpose and I’ve had control over my powers since I was ten. They brought me here in handcuffs.” He finished proudly.