noteful | Birthday Party for Laura/X-23

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Birthday Party for Laura/X-23

It's a pretty low-key party, all things considered, and not significantly different than the one Parker or Meg would have thrown in a dorm room for a friend at home, not-exactly-traditional menu not withstanding.

There's music, low enough to talk over (and maybe with a little more folk in the mix than one expects to find a party). Balloons and streamers in purple and blue and red. A place to leave presents. People to meet or catch up with.

And, most importantly, a chance to wish X-23 (or Laura) a very happy birthday.

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Cal shrugs a little, thinking.

"I guess," he says slowly, "the idea is that - uh. Reality takes care of itself. Things don't happen because a god makes them happen, they happen because . . . they react off each other. It just all works."

Oddly enough, the Gorgon smiles at that.

"I like the sound of that idea."

Cal blinks at that, but smiles.

"Beats the alternative, in my opinion."

She ducks her head down, snakes hissing softly.

"For...what it would mean...I think so, too. Although, without gods, I don't have my...parents."

"Oh. Yeah, that'd be a problem," Cal concedes. "A god-free world wouldn't do you much good if you weren't around to enjoy it."

"Besides, it'd be a very quiet world."

Cal shrugs a little at that.

"Nothing wrong with quiet sometimes."

Medusa shakes her head.

"The wind wouldn't sing, and neither would the waves. The stars would just be points of light, and the ground nothing but earth and dirt."

There is a pause.

". . . Okay," Cal concedes. "You got me there."

And if Cal was expecting Medusa to continue the serious, philosophical tone here, he is going to be disappointed.

Steepling her fingers with a smile, she says,

"Thought I might."

Cal laughs.

"I guess your world wouldn't work without gods any more than mine would probably work with them."

"That seems to be the conclusion." Beat. "Eaten anything yet?"

"Not yet," Cal says. "I was always taught not to eat spaghetti in public. Too messy."

It doesn't really matter here, but sometimes small matters of habit are hard to shake.

Medusa stares.

. . . which is briefly alarming, until Cal realizes what the glasses are for.

"What?"

"Messy."

"Yes? . . . have you had spaghetti before?" Cal asks.

"Yes. X introduced me to it."

When she was psychotic, but that's a story for another time.

". . . it's messy," Cal says, just in case that might somehow clarify things. Then he shrugs. "I don't know, it was just one of the rules for public behavior. For my family."

Medusa snorts at that.

"Children are messy eaters. If adults are, it just means that don't practice. It's..." She holds up one of her slender hands (patterned with henna). "We eat with our hands, in my culture. In polite society, you use only three fingers."

Cal is pretty sure it's not possible to eat spaghetti politely, but he can tell when a subject has hit its expiration date. Usually.

"Sounds a lot easier," he says.

"Actually," she says, "only three fingers is hard. And ladies only use the fingertips."

Beat.

"But then, in Milliways, everyone seems to use cutlery. It's very odd."

"Well," Cal says. "Pretty much everyone in Milliways is somewhere around my time, give or take a few decades. Or a couple centuries. Way after cutlery was invented, anyway. 'Swhat we're used to."

"Like having sex with your clothes on," Medusa mutters (mostly) under her breath.

Not quite under enough.

Cal blinks.

"- What?"

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