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The Perk : Thursday Early Afternoon

It still felt strange to walk around and not have to worry about looking over her shoulder. She still did since it was an ingrained habit by now but, as each day passed, she felt more and more comfortable with believing what Jaxon had told her about this place. He'd assured her the place was special, that it accepted all people and that she wouldn't have to worry about the NVD, the SVD, the Emim or the Rephaim there. He did say she might uncover a new set of problems but he thought she could deal with those new issues just fine.

Paige was fine with new issues. Definitely fine. The old issues were the ones that she needed to recover from and just the act of making her way into a small coffee shop, ordering something warm and caffeinated before taking a seat without worrying about being dragged off to the Tower or given the NiteKind were enough to start that process.

So far, things were good. Paige hadn't realized how much she needed this reprieve and this retreat away from SciLo until she'd settled into her apartment and bed a few nights ago. Any guilt she'd felt about leaving her friends behind had vanished when she'd fallen asleep and slept through the night for the first time in a long time.

Today was a day for sitting and drinking coffee. She had a few newspapers in front of her that she was browsing through in an attempt to catch up on the things she'd missed for one reason or another. She'd even left her spirit bodyguards behind for the time being. She didn't feel like she needed them.

[Open!]

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Celia was out for a brisk walk about town, in an effort to familiarize herself with the area where she'd be living for the foreseeable future. It had been so long since they'd stayed in one place for more than a few weeks that the idea that this was home was absolutely daunting.

She ducked into the coffee shop to warm up for a few moments, and ordered herself some tea. After she was done puzzling at the odd little paper cup and its little paper sleeve (did they not have mugs here?), she belatedly surveyed the other patrons, and realized she did in fact know one of them.

"Good afternoon, Miss Mahoney," she said politely, stopping by Paige's table. She didn't want to disturb her, but it seemed only right to say hello to a teacher outside of the classroom.

"Hello, Celia," she said, looking up from the array of newspapers to smile at the girl. "Come in for something warm you up as well? It wasn't winter where I came from. I didn't prepare very well."

"I don't know that I've spent this much time out-of-doors in years," Celia admitted. "I forgot what January is really like." Plus this seemed to be excessively cold, compared to how New York had been when she'd left. "Is it at least the same year where you're from?"

She'd traveled a hundred and thirty years in the future. The idea of also finding it to be abruptly winter when expecting summer added a whole new dimension of headachiness to the concept, for Celia.

"It is not," Paige said, shaking her head. She didn't know how that happened or how connected Jaxon was just to make it happen but he'd done it. Or, at least, he'd take credit for it.

"As far as I can tell, when I left London, it was the year 2068," she shared, still wide eyed about that. "So, I seem to have ended up in the past. Somehow."

It was clear that she didn't understand it at all.

Celia's eyes widened. "Oh, my. If it makes you feel any better, it was 1884 when I left New York. Traveling through time seems almost commonplace here -- though it's not something I've ever heard of happening at home."

Though maybe it did and no one discussed it with those who weren't gifted. Magic had a similar role, there.

"1884?" Paige's eyes widened even further. "Your culture shock must be even worse than mine. I'm finding several things familiar, at the very least. How are you adapting?"

Paige couldn't even imagine going that far into the future. Nearly everything had to be different and unfamiliar.

"It's not been too bad. Electric lighting seems to have come a long way, at least," Celia remarked with a small smile. "Mostly it's that everyone is so much more open here. With everything."

People back home did not discuss things like people did here. Thanks, Sparkle, for getting that out of the way pretty immediately.

"It must all seem so primitive to you, though," she added thoughtfully.

"You'd be surprised," Paige said and finally remembered her manners when she gestured to the open seat at her table. "Feel free to sit, if you'd like."

She, in turn, moved the newspapers out of the way to make some room.

"Where I'm from, you couldn't be open about what you were either," she shared. "So, while the technology and the electricity is slightly dated, the attitudes of people? They seem to have regressed."

Celia took the offered seat, settling her skirts around her so they wouldn't wrinkle. "I wonder if that's true for 2014 everywhere, or just this place. No one here seems especially surprised by my abilities, thus far, whereas my father makes his living on shocking people with his." She frowned. "It doesn't sound as though that attitude lasts long, though, if people are still afraid of such things where you're from."

"Very afraid," she added with a nod. "Being...different -- I guess that would be the best word -- is considered treason where I'm from."

SciLo wasn't a great vacation spot.

"It's a punishable offense and one that makes those who are different live both in fear and in the shadows. I don't know what to make of this place, honestly. It's an anomaly of sorts, I suppose. To me, at least."

"Treason?" Celia repeated incredulously. "But why? How would they even know unless you used your gifts irresponsibly?"

Celia didn't really know what would happen to her if she was discovered. She suspected she'd become quite famous, very quickly, but that was all she could think of.

"They thought it was an epidemic," she said, recalling the history of Scion London and how it'd developed. "A sickness, even. That being different, in this case, clairvoyant, was a threat to their empire."

It sounded so silly when she was sitting where she was now and no one here (that she knew of) was plotting the downfall of an entire city.

"There was crime, yes, but all of it was always pinned on a clairvoyant, an unnatural. Everything was blamed on us. My guess is fear of the unknown was the root cause of everything. Fear of the different. It spiraled insanely out of control."

"It seems so useful, though," Celia mused. "I can't do what you described in class, but I almost wish I could. You'd think the people in power would be pleased to have someone on their side who' can see...auras." She wasn't entirely sure of what that meant, really, but it sounded like something people might find helpful.

"That would be nice, wouldn't it?" Paige didn't think she'd ever see it happen in her lifetime though. "We make do though. We're labeled as criminals but we've learned how to adapt. Hopefully, though, it won't turn out like that for you."

Celia shook her head. "I don't think it will. People pay money to go see my father perform, though they don't necessarily think it's true magic," she said, rolling her eyes a little. "The people who might be afraid are able to believe it isn't real, still. I don't know if it's something that will ever come out in the open -- I think most audiences enjoy not having a definitive answer to what they're seeing. I hope it stays that way, anyway."

"That's good to hear," she said sincerely. "I don't know much about magic, if I'm being honest. Just what I've seen and heard about through people back home. Does your father consider it a form of entertainment or something more serious, more sophisticated?"

"Both," Celia said with a tiny smile. "It's a way of life, for both of us, but he uses it to entertain. It's easy to play the magician when what you can do is real. But it can be used for more advanced purposes. I can heal myself if I'm hurt, for instance, and once I'm stronger I'll be able to conjure or create nearly anything I can imagine. People in your time have magic, too?" That actually did worry her, a tiny bit.

The downside (downside?) of only having two classes was that whenever she wasn't dragged back home to deliver some justice into random evildoers was that Anya didn't have much things left to do with her time. She could run until she dropped, in theory, but that didn't seem as fun once you did it a couple times. Hence why the idea of getting coffee and some R & R seemed like a good one when it popped in her head.

It didn't take her long to spot a new face, or at least a new face to her; she could never tell with Fandom. "Hey there," she called out from the bar as she tried to pick something. "Are you a new teacher?" Although she looked kinda young, but then again, Fandom.

"If they do, it's not in the area I'm from," she clarified. "SciLo doesn't have magic. We have mediums like you mentioned in class but they do actually speak with the spirits through their connections aether. I know a few of them, in fact."

She missed them too. "SciLo is a very restrictive place right now. This is my first time in America. I don't know if magic does exist in other areas of the world."

"Good observation," she complimented, looking up from one of her newspapers. "I've barely been here a week yet. So, I'm the very definition of new."

"I didn't know real mediums existed," Celia admitted sheepishly. "I've been able to pretend, but only because people are so interested in the occult as a mystery where I'm from -- a floating candlestick or a tapping on a bell can mean the world to someone who believes in spirits. And until I came here, I was fairly skeptical on the actual existence of ghosts, anyway. Now I'm not sure."

That was true for a lot of things, now.

"Oh, they definitely exist," Paige said, chuckling. "Before I came here, I actually lived with one. He was called Pieter. He had such a temper but when Eliza, our medium, let him possess her, she'd paint a masterpiece that I'd be able to sell so we could make money."

Celia initially looked alarmed, but then relaxed a bit. "Can he possess anyone? Or just a medium? A real medium, I mean."

"Just a medium," she assured. "He couldn't possess me because I don't have the connection that Eliza does. I, on the other hand, can possess others."

Not that she was good at it or anything.

"I'm not going to, though. It requires that I actually leave my body which means I stop breathing and I have no reason to possess anyone here."

"You've done it before, though?" Celia asked, looking intrigued. "I imagine that such an ability might come in handy from time to time." Though that did explain why people would be afraid.

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The Perk : Thursday Early Afternoon

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