An Announcement (Open but if you ever see this Amit, you post with Brooke and post NOW)

[pyroprincess]

WHEN: Thursday morning, 6 am
WHAT: Stephanie goes out to where the press corps lies waiting, and afterwards
WHERE: Outside the Mansion
WHO: Open, but Amit I expect Brookage, dammit

Stephanie had made it known through her lawyers that she would come out to speak with the assembled press. She would stand there, in absolutely horrifying pain (she didn't dare numb herself with painkillers before facing the wolves), for a full hour and answer questions and speak publicly not ten feet from the location where she had been woven into the gates and possibly endanger many of her future ambitions. It had been made quietly known as well, through various friends of her father's, that Shaw Industries and its allies were growing increasingly impatient with the media circus surrounding the Institute. Quietly, people in government had been encouraged to begin making access harder, for the sake of ongoing investigation of course.

Would they all leave? Almost certainly not, but the truth was that the news cycle was going to turn soone ror later, and they'd start to thin out and more so with some encouragement, as new stories developed. She was keenly aware that her own brutal assault had probably prolonged their presence. An heiress, recently in some struggle over her fortune had been brutally assaulted and hung up by the gates of a school that had recently been revealed as a mutant training camp of some sort. It made for good copy and even more so for the blood and pain involved in it. Nothing sold papers in a dying industry like a good-looking woman in dire agony. Vicarious sympathy and vicious titillation, all in one.

She did her best not to wear her total loathing on her face as she walked up to the gate, and if a little bit of her utter scorn showed through, well, she was hobbling along on a cane. She knew that that, too, would make good copy. The brave convalescent, here to make an official statement. She stopped at the appointed place, flanked by a few handpicked people sent for her from Shaw Industries. She locked herself, ignoring her screaming joints and straightened as much as she could, wishing that she could tower over people like even her father often could. But in the end, it would only be a hastily made lecturn that would make her stand above them.

There was no respectful hush, not like when her father made his rare appearances before public. He had commanded fear and respect in equal measure- fear and respect he'd earned over decades of life in the public sphere. No matter how formidable, how beautiful, now brilliant or ruthless as she might have been, she was still a young woman in her early twenties. One who appeared to them as being vulnerable as much as anything, clearly recovering from a vicious assault. Invisible to them, she gripped the lecturn before speaking, the tension of her hands helping distract her a bit from ankles, knees, hip joints that did not- still did not feel right.

And then she made a ridiculous joke about not having prepared a speech, but she'd been preparing it in every moment she had where she wasn't afloat on a sea of painkillers. Honing it. Editing. Rewriting. She would admit to being a mutant, not as something to be ashamed of, but as something to be proud of, something to own, something that she was relieved she didn't have to lie about or not acknowledge to the world. How she had been brutally assaulted for having the temerity to have been born a mutant, like so many others. How when she had been a scared little girl, the school behind them had taken her in, taught her about her abilities and furthermore, how to be a good person and useful citizen. How regardless of what happens, it was her duty as a privileged mutant- like her father before her, to make the world a better place for all people. It finished with an appeal to a progressive, inclusive America and a better world, something that would not have seemed amiss in one of the President's speeches.

Questions came afterwards. A lot of them had to do about her current situation vis a vis the company, some of which were handled by Shaw lawyers. They were Shaw's men, all of them and they made it clear that whatever the legal situation was, Stephanie Shaw would be a large part of the future of the company. Some questions were about her time there. She was not really at liberty to speak too much about details, except for her clear opinion that the existence of the Institute was a plain necessity for mutants. That the worst thing about the school was that there were not more of them. Someone asked her about Marcelo. That was the occasion for a lighthearted joke about wanting to get back home. Few people laughed but there were a few smiles. Question period rolled on and on, the questions becoming less pointed and more into the realm of fluff questions. Eventually, some of the Shaw Industries people closed off the conference and she came down off the lecturn and went back into the school.

Now, it was time to take her painkillers like a good patient and wait poorly for her chance to go home tomorrow. Still though, even though it was a long and painful walk, she felt somehow lighter. It felt good to have the truth come out. Not to hide. The mutant community needed leaders, people who wore business suits and evening gowns, not superhero costumes. She wasn't delusional enough to think she would be wholly sufficient to the task, but she knew she'd make a more meaningful impact there than on the field of superpowered combat. But for now, she wanted coffee and painkillers and even more than that, to curl up with Marcelo. She went back up to her room and sat down with a cup of coffee, looking out with minor satisfaction at a few of the news vans starting to roll out. Probably more due to a new story developing somewhere than her efforts, but she could pretend.
 

Comments

[alisa_lebeau_v3]

Alisa quietly watched Stephanie's address on the TV that was in the room she shared with Alistaire. She was a bit doped up on pain killers as her leg had suddenly begun to hurt her like a son of a bitch, but she was able to fully understand what was going on around her. The speech practically one-up'ed Alisatire and in a BIG way. Her red on black eyes were half lidded as the press conference ended.

"She's good, but her Pere an' your Grandpere would roll over in his grave at bein' exposed like dis." Alisa sighed. "He was a very private man, after-all. But everyt'ing she said was right."

All of this made Alisa start to wonder if she was even working for the right person anymore. But she swore loyalty to Alisatire, even if their relationship in both work and private had become completely complicated. But there was something about Stephanie's speech that kind of touched her. Perhaps she really needed to think about her life more, especially since she nearly lost it not too long ago.

[light_as_a_rock]

Eva sat in the window of her favorite cafe, sipping coffee, and thinking about the news conference she had just seen.

She had never really hidden the fact that she was a mutant, but she'd never been all that open about it, either. Her father was publicly known, she was sure people wondered about her as well, but were too polite to ask. It was like mutant "don't ask, don't tell".

Of course, everyone back in Cumberland knew. She was half Guthrie. It was understood. Just like it was understood that there were enough Guthries in the county... more than a few of whom could uproot a live oak tree single-handedly... to make keeping secret any anti-mutant sentiments one might hold a wise idea.

She was also half Worthington, and the Worthingtons and the Shaws did not have the best history, no matter how polite and cordial they could be at public events. She tapped one manicured finger on the side of her cup. She watched the people going by outside the window, and wondered how many of them were hiding?

She reached for her phone, and tapped out a message.

@StephanieShaw - That was a brave thing you did.

[pyroprincess]

Stephanie recieved the message, from a slightly unexpected quarter and considered it for a moment. She was well aware of their history though she had been party to none of it- she'd known her father as something other than an abstraction for only about two years before he'd died. In any case, she had no intention of continuing any bad blood.

And it really was a thoughtful message.

@EvaWorthington- Brave? Perhaps. Necessity is the mother of courage as much as it is of invention. That being said, the sentiment is appreciated.

[light_as_a_rock]

@StephanieShaw - Don't make light of it. I know that wasn't an easy thing to do.

Eva knows, because she probably wouldn't have done it.

[pyroprincess]

@EvaWorthington- There is nothing light about necessity. It wasn't easy, but it needed to happen.

The problem with such things was that someone had to be first. Stephanie Shaw wasn't the very first person to admit being a mutant in such a fashion, but she was among the first socially prominent people to do so, after none other than her nephew Alistaire, of course. Certainly amongst those who had a choice about it.

Each person had it a little bit easier afterwards.

[vesper_verde]

Marcelo pressed the button to shut off the television in his Vesper Cave. He leaned back in his leather chair and rubbed his chin. He had thought about offering to be there, standing back there for support. However, he thought Stephanie had things well in control again. So, he opted to spend the time making sure the new additions to his Vesper gear were tweaked and ready to go.

It seemed ready so he reached over to his workbench and grabbed his phone. He figured he would call his lady love and then go outside to check on the workmen installing a pool. It followed the extremely busy pattern his life had taken while Stephanie recuperated at Xavier's. He hit the speed dial and waited for her to answer.

[pyroprincess]

It took all of one ring for Stephanie to reach over and pick up the phone, this time, thankfully, with no crunching involved. She'd since graduated to handing her own cell phone needs. Which was good, as she wasn't sure how many more phone she wanted to replace.

"Hello, mi amor. Tell me that you are ready to take me away from this place tomorrow." The voice was sweet enough. She'd done a good job of covering up the near-constant annoying aches and pains. Hopefully they would go away in time.

[vesper_verde]

"Alô, querida. I was ready to bring you home the second day." He grinned a little to himself. "I missed you so much, I had a pool built so you could go skinny dipping."

He swiveled his chair toward the door and slowly got to his feet. "You ready to come back into my arms?"

[pyroprincess]

"A pool? Hm. Well, I suppose the inevitable rehabilitative therapy could be done in the nude." She was teasing a little, though the truth was, it would be a long time until she was back in the condition she had been, if that would ever truly be the case.

"I await your big strong arms eagerly." She couldn't help but smile and the lighter tone came through in her voice. "Though you will have to be careful with me, mi amor, I am still a fragile healing thing."

[vesper_verde]

"A pool. You get to pick out the roofscaping going around it." He didn't mind the teasing. It was like getting back closer to normal. Even if he saw that as far down the road.

"I can be tender and gentle," he assured. "I was that way until you realized you really liked sex."

He could tease back just as much.

[pyroprincess]

"I still do. And it's going to be very frustrating not being able to have it for awhile." Stephanie sighed. "We'll have to get creative, you and I." Not that she didn't think he was up to the challenge.

"Poor you, though. Having me so near by all the time. And going through all those intense exercises in the pool. Nude." She smirked, teasing right back.

[vesper_verde]

"We'll figure something out. With or without the massage table that's arriving in a couple of days." He might have been on a minor spending spree. it was to make up for the depleted liquor cabinet.

He opened the door to the third bedroom and stepped out. He stopped in his tracks to blink at the mental image of a nude Stephanie working out. "Hmm. I'll probably have to do a work-out myself. With just one hand."

[pyroprincess]

"It is a good thing that my little personal assistant is not here right now." Stephanie smirked. "She would be so scandalized. But a pool and a massage table? You must have missed me. Next I will hear that you have ordered a case of the 1947 Rioja and a few bottles of my favorite Armagnac." She was still teasing, of course. Though she really did want a drink. Or maybe a cigar.

"And I can think of better things you could do with those hands."

[vesper_verde]

"The Armagnac, yes. I'll order the Rioja tonight." He made sure the bedroom door closed behind him. "I have some cigars waiting for you, too."

He started to walk toward the doors to check on the workmen. "I can, too, but they'd distract you too much from your intense physical therapy. I want you to heal. Then you can ride me properly."

He smirked to himself as looked out the glass doors.

[pyroprincess]

"I don't want to wait until tomorrow. I want you to come get me right now and take me home." Stephanie almost surprised herself with how easily she called it "home", but there it was. It really was home for her. "I look forward to that day. Very, very much."

"I want to go home, mi amor, mi corazon. Where you are."

[vesper_verde]

"I would come and get you if they'd let you go. I don't think righteous indignation for taking such good care of my beloved would get me very far." It was light humor to cover the fact Stephanie had caught him by surprise. He knew she loved him, but when she gave him glimpses of how deeply, he felt awestruck and a tiny bit guilty.

"Você vira meu mundo de ponta cabeça. Com você tudo fica melhor. I'll bring you home. I promise."