Pity was not the reason why Sveta came back to the bar. Honestly, she was not even sure what the reason was. It was a mixture of many things, probably. A little bit of curiosity, maybe a bit of boredom, and also the fact that Matt somehow understood the things he had been through without having to analyze them. And didn't make a fuss.
Also, he was an adapted.

>>“Suppose so. I mean, I’ve gone this long without having it do much of anything, and that didn’t really change in a few days’ time. I think the only person it really affects is you, at this point.”

It was hard to tell if mutants were being affected by an adapted. Some couldn't even tell, unless they tried to activate their powers. Matt could have been walking past mutants left and right, without ever really getting into trouble. Or not.

>>“Don’t tell me that’s the real reason you dropped by. Just had to sit in the radius?”

"Gotta admit that one" Sveta smirked "You're like a personal spa. Do you charge for that?"

It was nice to sit in an adapted aura. No buzz, and definitely no danger of causing an accident. Given how rare adapteds were, Sveta felt no shame about taking advantage of that.

"In case you were wondering, no, you didn't say anything embarrassing the other night. Not any more than I did."

Suddenly, Matt was remembering why he liked Svetlana in the first place. He did remember liking her, anyway. She was easy to talk to, with no bullsh**. There wasn't anything that she said that seemed to be as fussy as some of the people that wandered into the place. She just was. It was easy like that.

"Maybe I should start charging, huh?" Matt replied, smirking just a little. He had no idea what it felt like for her, but it must've been pretty good from the way she was describing it. Hey, personal spa was pretty marketable, if only to a select amount of the population. There was probably some sort of underground group that would want something like that. He wasn't seriously considering anything of the sort, but it didn't sound like the worst thing to just stand somewhere and get paid for it.

They'd cleared up the fact that she wasn't there to baby him, though, so that was nice, and he didn't mind if she really was just there because she wanted to sit in the aura. It would make sense, anyway. More sense than she just liked to join in on bar fights, anyway, although he couldn't quite put that past her.

"In case you were wondering, no, you didn't say anything embarrassing the other night. Not any more than I did."

Matt scoffed under his breath as he got out a rag and began to wipe down the countertops again. There was a little bit of blood that had been sprayed on the top, so it needed to be properly disinfected. "Well that's not really much of a consolation," he said as he worked. "I don't remember some of the stuff you said, either." There were clear memories from that night, but a lot of it was also a blur. It was hard to tell what was what sometimes. Had he really told her all that he remembered? And had she really been kidnapped three times? It definitely seemed like it.

"You must be a glutton for punishment, though, walking back in here. I'm surprised you even still want to speak to me," said Matt, probing just a little. Sure, she could've just wanted to sit in his aura, but she could do that silently if she wanted to.

>>"Maybe I should start charging, huh?"

"Depends on how well you handle weirdos." Sveta pointed out. Honestly, charging for anything power-related brought creeps out of the woodwork like nobody's business. If he wanted to bring that on himself, he deeded to charge a lot to make it worth it...
She wasn't just there for the aura, though, freebie or not.

>>"Well that's not really much of a consolation. I don't remember some of the stuff you said, either... You must be a glutton for punishment, though, walking back in here. I'm surprised you even still want to speak to me,"

Sveta arched an eyebrow. She wondered if he really did not remember much of what they walked about, or if this was just his way of offering her a way out of discussing embarrassing things.

"Honestly, speaking to you was not a punishment" she noted "I don't... know about you, but there are not many people I could have talked with like dat... I know, we were drunk. And I'm not here to make that a regular thing." she smirked "It's just..." she chuckled "Most people hit on me before they get to see the damage." she shrugged "Dunno. Felt like stopping by."

“I’m fantastic with weirdos,” Matt said with a wink. That was his job, wasn’t it? Being good with people? That, and pouring the right amount of alcohol for people. He was usually good at both. Of course, he didn’t normally share his deepest, darkest secrets with every pretty blonde that walked in, but that was a different story.

Still, the weirdos that offering up the services of an adapted would bring out would likely be more than he could handle. Svetlana was great, but who knew what a few more of her kind could bring in with them? There had to be people that would kill for that sort of power around them, or rather, lack thereof. He could do people a favour, but what would it be at the expense of? He was better off just keeping to himself. That much was always made very clear to him.

As a joke, he’d suggested that she liked the punishment of talking to him. Matt was good at distant relationships, and even better at pushing people away once they got too close. He was doing neither to her, though, and he couldn’t decide how he felt about that. Svetlana didn’t hate it, though, so that was a plus. They had been drunk, and so they’d poured out things that they wouldn’t normally have. He’d felt more exposed that night than he ever had, but it had been good. He’d needed to open those wounds a bit wider so he could lick them clean properly. If she hadn’t been there to help, then there would be no telling what would have happened to him.

He nodded gently at what she said, scratching the bridge of his nose with the edge of his thumb while he stood silently. His other arm had crossed over his chest as he leaned against the back countertop. What she said made sense, for sure, and it was true for him as well. “You’re one of a kind, Svetlana,” he started, sighing as he took her in. If she hadn’t caught him so off guard, or done most of the things she’d done that night, then he very well might have hit on her. It was good that he hadn’t, clearly. “Thanks for stopping by, then.”

Drinking on the job was not a regular thing for him; it was not even an occasional thing. He would pour beers for her, but he had no plans to partake. Instead, he could talk to her from behind the bar while he was working. Since it was slow, there was nothing stopping him from doing so, either. “So, then. Anything new? How’s the job been lately?”

>>“You’re one of a kind, Svetlana,”

"Yeah, like everyone else." Sveta smiled back over the counter. It was good to know that Matt was actually a decent guy, even when sober. Neither of them was really their usual self the last time they met. But now that he knew she was not here out of pity for him, Matt seemed to enjoy having a talk.

>>“So, then. Anything new? How’s the job been lately?”

"Well, I haven't been kidnapped in weeks, so" she smirked, drinking her beer "I'd say things are going pretty well. And it's... you know, an actual job. People trust me to do stuff. It's weird." she chuckled. It had been... forever, since she had responsibilities like a normal adult. It took some getting used to.

It wasn’t often that Matt came across someone like her. When he wasn’t drunk or fading into the darkest parts of himself, he enjoyed spending time with her. She was interesting to talk to, and she seemed far more genuine than many of the people that he saw walk in there. He wasn’t having some nothing conversation with her, even when he was.

She also knew things about him that most people didn’t, which meant that he had nothing to hide. Again, this was unusual. Most people that he talked to knew very little about him and didn’t care to change that fact. He was also fine with that setup; his business was his business. But to know that she knew all about his sh** and was still sitting there… that was a nice change of pace for him. For them both, really.

“You measure success in terms of not being kidnapped,” Matt said, shaking his head at her. He did feel bad about it, but she clearly wasn’t too beat up about that fact, so he wasn’t going to be either. Instead, he simply listened as she told him her experiences with starting her new job and getting used to it. It was always a challenge to adjust to a new routine, but for someone like Svetlana, he could imagine that it was even more difficult. She wasn’t a typical person - she had been kidnapped, came to the country as a mail order bride, and she was a mutant. Of course she would find it a little tricky to adjust to the new style of having someone depend on her.

With a smirk, Matt nodded at her statements. “It loses its appeal after a while, trust me,” he said. “What kinds of things do they have you doing, anyway?”

>>“You measure success in terms of not being kidnapped,”

"Yup." Sveta grinned. She had been kidnapped more often than the average person, and she was lucky enough to have gotten out of it each time. It was probably shocking to hear for a normal person, but in her own head it made sense: Haven was the first place she could trust to keep her safe, and even if they failed, they would just send Noel after her to kick some *ss and take some memories. And they kept her busy.

>>“It loses its appeal after a while, trust me. What kinds of things do they have you doing, anyway?”

"Well, we work with mutant rights" she shrugged "Right now I monitor news on what is happening around de world... and trying to get some news to compare from the other side. As surprising as it is, I think we are doing slightly better on mutant rights than the other New York..." she sighed. She had been keeping an eye on SUPER and possible SUPER activity. She knew them better than anyone at Haven.

Mutant rights was an issue that Matt wasn’t entirely versed on. While he liked to read and keep up with the news, the issue simply hadn’t been at the forefront of his mind most days. If he had to classify himself, it would be as an uninvolved supporter of the cause; he agreed with most of the stances, but he didn’t follow it so much. The part of his life where he’d devoted his time and energy to fighting battles or winning wars was finished, and he was just trying to get through.

That wasn’t, however, to say that he didn’t care about the issue at all. Actually, he found it interesting what Svetlana telling him, the way that she worked toward the betterment of a species. It was pretty commendable, really.

The other New York was a completely different issue altogether. One day, a giant rip had decided to open up in New York city and let loose an alternate time stream. Matt hadn’t been; nor had he met his double, but he’d heard some things that would rock a person to their core. Was there a version of Sophie that was still alive? Had they even met in that universe? He wasn’t sure if he wanted to know.

“Any interesting news?” he asked, cocking his head as he regarded her. He was still leaning against the back countertop with his arms crossed over his chest. There was nothing else to do, since the cooks had taken care of most of the dirty work. At least, there was nothing else to do until one of the guys in the corner made a pitiful noise and shuffled his legs, scraping his shoes against the floor.

With a sigh, Matt pushed himself off the countertop and walked around the bar to see how the guy was doing. He looked fine, just dazed. Stopping just beyond the barrier, he turned around and grabbed a glass of water for him. He held it out, and after a second, the guy took it from him. “Either sit down and get yourself together or beat it, alright?” he told him. It was a gentle command, but it held weight behind it. He’d kicked out plenty of people in his time.

Matt did not seem very excited about mutant rights. Honestly, put it like that, Sveta was not surprised. She used the term on purpose; it made her work sound like any of the million NGOs in New York, trying to do good things. She did not really want to go into details, because it would have been hard to step around the whole 'I'm a member of the secret inner circle of an organization that works for mutant rights wile also fighting SUPER and occasionally going out in costumes.'

>>“Any interesting news?”

"Since a new dimension opened up in New York? Lots." Sveta smirked. That described the whole SUPER situation pretty decently.

One of the knocked out participants of the bar fight was coming around. Matt went to check on him.

>>“Either sit down and get yourself together or beat it, alright?”

The guy muttered and got on his feet, deciding to take the latter option. He gave Sveta a mean look while he shuffled out. Sveta waved.

"The whole rip thing freaks me out a little." she sighed, turning back to their topic "I just hope no other dimensions decide to come knocking. One has f*** things up enough."

Yeah, okay, fair. Matt glanced back and raised his eyebrow at Svetlana’s sassy comment about the new dimension that had just opened in the middle of the city. All other news would likely pale in comparison to that, or stem from the same cause. That much was likely obvious, but he had been foolish enough to ask. Maybe he had deserved the sass coming from her; he’d been blind enough to forget about the obvious.

“Specifically?” he countered, giving her the slightest bob of his head as he continued to probe about what she did. Her sass gave him no actual insight into what it was that she was working on. Did she just read the news, or did she monitor it specifically? Do something about it? That much wasn’t actually clear. Maybe she was being intentionally vague. To be fair, she’d had approximately zero shots, so she was likely a little more likely to be clammed up than the last time they’d talked.

The guy on the ground had decided that he was better of leaving. He shoved the water glass back into Matt’s hand, shot an angry look at Svetlana, and then walked out the door. He must’ve been one of the ones that she’d knocked out.

Walking back behind the bar, he nodded at her comment, though he did so slowly. He hadn’t even considered the fact that there might be more dimensions than the one that had appeared. Was there a chance that they could deal with two separate dimensions intruding on their comfortable reality? The idea was actually a little absurd. Rather than sharing his thoughts on it, though, Matt simply continued to nod as he put the water glass away. It might’ve looked a little strange as it went on, but he was too deep in thought to notice.

He pulled himself out as he turned around to face her again. “Did you meet your… twin, or whatever? The other version of you?” What would she be like? Would she also measure the success of a week by not being abducted?

“Do you think it’ll go away, either? Close up ‘n all? Lots of people come in here and spout theories, but I think you’re the first person with the potential to actually know something about it.”

He asked for specifics. Sveta arched an eyebrow. She did not even know where to start with the kinds of news she had to wade through. Doppelganger encounters turning into identity thefts; dangerous mutants popping up, SUPER chasing people down, METAbots malfunctioning all over the place, people getting new ideas about governments on the two sides... two sets of X-men, SUPER, Haven, and whatever else they did not yet know about. Some of it was in the news; a lot of it was between the lines. It was hard to summarize.

>>“Did you meet your… twin, or whatever? The other version of you?”

"My doppelganger?" Sveta smirked, and shook her head "Thank god, no. Best guess, she's either dead in Russia, or married to the president." she chuckled, sipping her beet "Met some copies of my friends, though. Freaky. And some don't even look alike."

>>“Do you think it’ll go away, either? Close up ‘n all? Lots of people come in here and spout theories, but I think you’re the first person with the potential to actually know something about it.”

Sveta shrugged slowly at the question. Honestly, she did not know.

"If there is a way to close it, it needs to be closed" she noted. There was no doubt about that part. "I hope someone is working on that."

The dopples weren’t always twins, exactly. Sometimes, they led completely different lives and looked nothing alike. Genetics and all that. The choices that people made could lead to incredibly different results. It was that infinite universes theory - there were millions of ways that things could play out, and a million different combinations of how those could all play out. If you thought about it, there was a never-ending list. It was amazing that they had run into the specific one that they did.

That being said, there was no reason that Svetlana’s dopple should look like her. Or that they would have collided. It was a big world, after all, it may have just been happenstance that she ended up in New York. There were a million places that the other her could have gone instead. “Sometimes it’s easier not knowing,” Matt mused. That was how he felt, anyway. Better to just leave it be and hope that it passed quickly.

She had had more interaction with the doppels, though. Matt had watched one interaction between two identical men (which had made him wonder if he was breathing in too many fumes), but other than that, he had been pretty sheltered. If she was on the front lines, though, then it was more likely that she would have had the chance to see what it was really like. He gave her an impressed expression as she told him about running into the doubles of friends, but he didn’t comment otherwise.

Either way, the RIP needed to be closed. They all needed to go on with their lives and hope that nothing worse would come for them. For some reason, he was still living in New York, which always seemed to be the epicentre of dangerous things, and hoping that things would get better, but he held out hope. He probably always would.

“Well, let’s hope someone somewhere is working on that, then,” he said. He’d been covert before; he knew how certain bases could operate under a lot of secrecy when things were going down. Hopefully, somewhere, someone was doing just that.

A few more of the guys in the corner were starting to file out after the first guy. Matt simply nodded at each one as they left, following them with his eyes to make sure they didn’t start anything else. There was nothing to hype them up anymore, thankfully. “I don’t know if I asked last night, but where’d you learn to fight like that, anyway? Didn’t look military, and if you tell me that you throw punches while you’re going through the news then I’m going to have some more questions.”

>>“Sometimes it’s easier not knowing,”

It certainly was. Sveta didn't want to know what happened to the other Sveta, because the likelihood of her own life going sideways at any given point was much greater than how lucky she had been, overall, in this dimension. She could understand why Matt would not want to know either. What if her wife was alive on the other side? Married to another him? Or married to someone else?...

>>“Well, let’s hope someone somewhere is working on that, then,”

"I'll drink to dat" Sveta smirked, taking a swig of her beer.

>>“I don’t know if I asked last night, but where’d you learn to fight like that, anyway? Didn’t look military, and if you tell me that you throw punches while you’re going through the news then I’m going to have some more questions.”

"School." she chuckled, not really hesitating with her answer "They had some self-defense training at Xavier's... some of is it self-taught. Oh, and last time I was kidnapped, they tried to train me as a secret government agent."

“Of course they did,” Matt said with a nod. Why would he have expected anything else? This was Svetlana, and she was powerful. Of course someone would want to weaponize her. Hell, if he was a government agent he would probably be thinking along the same lines as the people who had kidnapped her. It was amazing that she was sitting here being so nonchalant about the whole thing, too; as if it hadn’t messed her up completely.

Maybe Matt was just a complainer.

He was used to taking life in strides, but it had taken its toll on him. Maybe it had for her, too, but she did a better job of pushing it down. Better at moving on. Maybe he had something to learn from her. Well, that was likely a given, but he had to figure out what her secret was first.

“Want another beer? I think it’s fair to say that it’s on the house tonight,” he said, nodding to her quickly emptying glass. He wasn’t looking for a repeat of the night before, but she could hold her liquor well and he wasn’t drinking with her. It was alright to pour a bit more for her, even if he needed to work on his portions for some of the other guys that strode in there on a regular basis. With any luck, Svetlana wasn’t going to be starting another bar fight.

His shift was done in another fifteen minutes. With any luck, his replacement was going to walk in there and relieve him so he wouldn’t have to deal with last guy in the corner: the one who had started everything. “So what is it that you do to cope with sh**? Or do on a regular basis, anyway? Other than starting stuff here, of course.”

>>"Of course they did,”

Sveta shurgged. Saying it out loud, it sounded unreal, like something out of a spy movie. And yet, it happened to her. She was not about to make a fuss about it; sometimes she wanted to, but this was not the place, nor the time. In order to properly b*tch about the whole thing, she would have needed to disclose a lot more than what she already told Matt.

>>“Want another beer? I think it’s fair to say that it’s on the house tonight,”

"I'm good, thank you" she smiled "I don't do the whole binge drinking thing every day. Only on special occasions."

She was more of a social drinker. When 'social' meant hanging out with like-minded people.

>>“So what is it that you do to cope with sh**? Or do on a regular basis, anyway? Other than starting stuff here, of course.”

Sveta paused for a moment, considering the question.

I beat up bad guys in alleys.
I used to, anyway.

"I'm... still learning that." she admitted a little sheepishly "I work out, and... eat junk food or drink when I feel like it. I put a lot of energy into work, that seems to help... But if you have any other suggestions, I'm all ears."