May Logs: Part II
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Sunday, May 11, 2008, 8:47 PM
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=XS= Medbay and Lab - Lv B2 - Xavier's School
Walls are sterile white and surfaces gleam in polished stainless steel, the large room a vision of cool science tinged with the faint medical smell of antiseptic and filled with the soft whirring of autoclaves, refrigeration units, and various medical scanners and devices. Four hospital beds are present near the entrance, curtains rigged to allow for privacy, but pulled back when not in use. In shielded alcoves off the back wall are the resident doctor's pride and joy: A full-body X-Ray machine, as well as an MRI unit and other heavy-duty imagery equipment. Between the alcoves, through a thick glass window, a small operating theatre can be glimpsed. In the lab section, an electron microscope and a pair of gene-sequencers take place of pride, glassware and smaller equipment kept securely locked away in the cabinets underneath and above the work surfaces.
[Exits : [M]ain [H]allway]
There are many things peculiar about Tim's appearance as he slowly waddles his way through the doors to the Lab. He's considerably more dirty than a Tim usually is, for one, potting soil stains on his clothing and forehead, though his hands seem recently washed in contrast. He is also only wearing one shoe. His right foot is bare and has recently been bandaged with some proficiency. As for the missing shoe? He's carrying it in his hand along with a blood soaked sock. His breathing is hard and there is the slight touch of oh so familiar Tim panic on his face and thoughts.
Jean is revelling in having free use of her left arm again, and in being back from a Mothers' Day dinner at the Grey family homestead. This has resulted in a whole -mess- of science being conducted, and although it is still in progress, it is currently in the stages of hurry-up-and-wait, as a collection of DNA samples run themselves through PCR. She is at her desk, a new medical journal cracked open, and an expression of all being right with the world. This dissolves into worry within seconds of Tim coming through the door. "Tim! Good God, what happened, are you all right? Can you make it over to one of the exam beds? Why wasn't I informed?"
"I'm sorry Dr. Grey, I just found it. I didn't know, I didn't know at all." Tim apologizes still panicking. His isn't completely out of it yet, though, and does as he's asked: waddling over to the exam bed shaking his head all the way. He is careful not too much weight on the injured foot, but he makes the trip just fine.
"Didn't know-- What--" But, with an effort and a careful pause before rising, Jean gathers her own wits more neatly about her, and shrugs on medical practice along with her lab coat. "All right," she directs, more calmly and with a brief pat to his shoulder. "Why don't you start at the beginning while I get a tray of supplies over here."
Tim takes some deep breaths, some manner of composure conjured up the instant Dr. Grey's pat lands. "It was in my shoe, I don't know how it got in there. I think I broke it in the Kitchen just now." Tim puts his hands on the bed and with some effort the short lad pulls himself up into it, laying the shoe down next to him with the sock. His fingers reach into the shoe and a small electric device is pulled out attached to along copper wire still connected to the insides of his shoe. The black plastic that surrounds the small little box is shattered into loosely connected shards. At least one of which has some blood on it.
Jean has gotten a pair of latex gloves on in the time between patting Tim's shoulder and being presented with the device. There's nonetheless a certain amount of gingerness to her motions as she holds out a hand for it. "I... see. I'll have to have Forge or perhaps Dr. McCoy take a look at this," she concludes, coming to the assessment personally that it is a broken bit of electronics. "But where were your shoes left, the last time you were parted from them? And who did the bandaging on your foot?"
Glad to be rid of the evil box, he hands it over eagerly with an approving nod. "Cassy put the bandage on, she used the first aid kit in the kitchen." Tim answers, taking the easy question first. "And, uhm, these are my new shoes, I've had 'em about a week... I... take 'em off a lot, specially at the park and stuff." Tim is a little ashamed to admit this last bit.
"I'm glad to see that her first aid courses paid off," Jean murmurs, placing the small box inside a metal pan to be dissected later. After a moment's thought and a flight of fancy, she places another pan over top of it, her lips still quirked as she turns back to Tim. "Not quite broken in yet? Although I guess I can spare you the lecture on risks of stepping on dirty needles... I'm going to need to unwrap Cassy's excellent bandaging work, just to make sure there's no glass or other debris."
The boy nods his head quickly in agreement, scooting back further in the bed so that his foot sticks out more comfortably. "I'm sorry, Dr. Grey." Tim apologizes again. Its a running trend so far. "I... left a piece back in the kitchen, the part that went in. It was about... that big. Tim's fingers go out to show an imaginary sliver about an inch long. "Do you think it has anything to do with that strange man last week?""
The boy nods his head quickly in agreement, scooting back further in the bed so that his foot sticks out more comfortably. "I'm sorry, Dr. Grey." Tim apologizes again. Its a running trend so far. "I... left a piece back in the kitchen, the part that went in. It was about... that big." Tim's fingers go out to show an imaginary sliver about an inch long. "Do you think it has anything to do with that strange man last week?"
"Tim," says Jean with a slight shake of her head and another pat of his shoulder. "You don't need to apologize -- it's not like you hurt yourself on purpose. But let's see here..." She trails off, plucking up a pair of scissors to snip away the bandaging and looking up with her fine brows narrowed at the speculation. "That... depends on what it is that you stepped on. Have you noticed him or anyone else unfamiliar hanging around lately? I suppose this -could- just be a prank gone wrong. Oh, ouch, that looks painful," The wound is exposed, it seems. "Did Cassy clean it at all?"
To both questions, Tim just shakes his head. "She told me I should clean it, but I came right down here to show you this thing. I thought I should do that first." Priorities! Potential bad stalker coming first in Tim's mind as opposed to the cut in his foot. The cut is deep, an inch wide and an inch deep right into the arch of his foot. "I haven't seen him since that time, but... I've kidna stayed in since then, too. Except to buy these shoes and go help in the clinic on the weekends."
"Tell me about when you were shoe-shopping, Tim," Jean requests, teeth gritted slightly as she examines the cut, and interrupts any telling briefly with the decision of "I'm going to give you a local anaesthetic while I work on that. It's a sensitive area, and I don't want you hurting." With another pat, she retreats long enough to get a small bottle and a syringe, and fill the latter form the former.
"It doesn't hurt." Tim says at the mention of the sedative. It isn't fear of the shot in his voice, either. For Tim it is true, as much as it should be hurting and as bad as the cut is, he hasn't reacted with any pain to her handling of it at all. "Well, I bought them at the thrift store, I... didn't want to be a burden or anything, so I tried to find some cheap ones. One of the clerks helped me find 'em, they were brand new and in my size, looked just like my old shoes, except they were white."
"It ought to," says Jean, and her lips thin out just a little more. "And if this is shock talking, it'll wear off and hurt later, but... look away," she directs, and plucks up another needle tip. "I'm going to just do a little testing of your nerves. Tell me when you feel things, but don't look." One by one, the tips of his toes are pricked at, light enough to do no harm, but sharp enough to be felt normally.
Tim does as he's asked, but he is a little confused as he does it. He looks away before Jean picks up the needle. The toes don't move when they are poked, Tim doesn't react to it at all until the third one. "You're touching my toes?" Touching is the choice of words, not poked, not pricked.
"Pricking them with a needle, actually," reports Jean, the furrow to her brow deepening considerably as she sets down the needle in question. "You -should- be having a pain response... and -yet-." She shakes her head. "Well, I'll give you the local for -my- comfort, then. And does the thrift store normally get new goods donated like that?" she wonders, leaving aside one mystery for another. The needle full of anaethetic pricks once, twice, thrice and again, delivering numbing in its wake. And then Jean goes to get herself a trusty saline solution.
"Uhm... I don't know. All the other shoes looked pretty beat up. Most of the stuff there does. I just thought I really lucked out." Tim explains, still not quite picking up on the obvious himself. Like the needle before, Tim has no reaction to the the anesthetic being injected other than to say "That feels funny." as he turns around slowly to see what Jean is doing again.
"It seems a bit of a baroque plan," Jean muses, returning with the saline solution inside of a big fat syringe with the needle removed. She crouches then, steadying Tim's injured foot with her left hand, while her right forces the syringe up against the wound site and begins to irrigate it, flushing out any lurking bits of things with a series of controlled pulses. Telekinesis does away with the need for an orderly to hold the catch basin beneath. "Plant a pair of shoes they hope you'll want, in a store they hope you'll frequent, in order to plant... something." There's a clink as something is flushed loose. "On the other hand," she admits, "I've run across crazier ones."
Occasionally Tim is capable of figuring some things out on his own. A brief bit of understanding flashes through his mind and his mouth begins to goldfish as he tries to jog it into a coherent sentence. "Walter... he's the one who told me about the thrift store... when that guy was following us."
"And the man following you was close enough to overhear, do you think?" Jean questions, taking a statement of sorts as she works at making sure there are no more bits of things stuck inside Tim's foot. The saline is swapped out for a syringe full of betadine solution, to kill whatever pathogens might be lurking from the puncture wound. "And when did you get your last tetanus shot Tim, do you remember?"
"He was pretty close, yeah. We could hear him, just didn't think anything of him 'til Walter heard the camera and asked him about it. Uhm..." Tim answers, but when it comes time to talk about his shot record he has to think quite a bit, his tongue poking out the side of his mouth as the gears turn. "Pops... didn't take me to see the doctor at all. Told me to never talk to one and never trust one. When the school needed records of my shots and stuff... he faked 'em I think."
"No doubt because any doctor getting a look at you would know what's up." A very thin line indeed is Jean's mouth as she sets aside the second syringe. "Well, you're getting one now, and I'll get you started on a series of boosters for everything else." Firmly, she pats him on the shoulder again. "Now, I'm going to bandage your foot up again. I could try stitches or glue, but the location's such that I think it would be better to leave it open to drain a bit. Would you know the man if you saw him again?"
"I'm... I don't think so." Tim just shakes his head a little disappointed in himself. His eyes leave Jean and his foot and look down at his hands in his lap. "He was wearing a hat and sunglasses. He had blond hair... was kinda tall... but thats all I can remember."
"Well, I'll pass on what I can to the gate guards," assures Jean, and begins to first pad Tim's instep, and then secure the pad in place with gauze as neat and tidy as Cassy's, but a bit faster on the application. Practice, perfection, etc. "Now, you'd worn th shoes before, and hadn't felt anything odd about them?"
It is a big shrug. Tim has exceeded his useful answers at this point. "I... don't know? They never really felt right, they were pretty uncomfortable. I like my old ones a lot better. I'm sorry, Dr. Grey. I just don't know."
"Tim," says Jean, with a look up from her bandaging, "You have -nothing- to apologize for." One firm look later, she ties off the bandage, straightens, and goes in search of her vaccines.
"Thanks Dr. Grey." Tim replies as he steps off the bed and tests his balance on the new bandaged foot. "I just really don't want to be any more trouble for you. I seem to bring a lot of it."
"You are absolutely not trouble for me, Timothy Hall," Jean informs Tim with a firm tip of her chin. "Now, the padding should take most of the pressure off, but I want you to stay off it as much as possible until things have started to knit."
Nodding to the instructions, Tim thinks for a minute. He bends down to unlace his other shoe and leaves it next to the first one... just in case. "Alrighty, I'll be careful with it. Promise. G'night Dr. Grey!" And with that, he begins the slow and careful trip up to his room.
Tim is broken! And there is a Creepy Stalker Guy.
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Monday, May 12, 2008, 9:09 PM
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=NYC= Apt 1400 |Norah| - Greenwich Apartments - Greenwich Village
It's a disaster. It's an incredible mess. But it's Norah's apartment, and in her defense, she's redecorating.
The main space is quite large for an apartment, an open space flowing between kitchen, living area, and office area. How it is furnished is pretty unclear, seeing as all the furniter is pushed together into the middle and covered by drop cloths that also cover the hardwood floors. There's at least a couch, table, and a handful of chairs under the cloths, maybe a bookcase or two.
The kitchen area is a little more put together, sparsely decorated but servicable with all the requirements for a single person's life: fridge, freezer, microwave, toaster, stove, oven. The fridge is covered by magnetic alphabet letters, some formed into a partial scrabble game. The rest of the letters perform the service of holding up pictures of family, friends, and the occasional wedding announcement.
A raised office area contains just a rickety table and a laptop for the moment, and the doors to the single bedroom and bathroom remain definitively closed.
[Exits : [O]ut]
[Players : Norah ]
The bright, almost grassy-green paint on the apartment walls has dried, but things still definitely seem to be in a settling-in state when Norah calls up Jean to invite her by to inspect the handiwork. There's still not quite enough furniture to fill the space, and what there is is mostly second-hand: a couch, a soft chair, a rough-cut table with folding chairs around it. But Norah's started to add a few touches to make the space look a little more lived-in, adding curtains in blue and green to the windows. The colors definitely give the space a lively, youthful feel. Norah's in the kitchen as she waits for Jean's arrival, putting spoonfuls of cookie dough out on to a tray.
And lo, a Jean cometh! Knock, knock, knock on the door, for while she retains a key to the apartment as a good landlady ought, she is also a -polite- landlady. Standing out in the hallway dressed in jeans and a cream peasant blouse with blue satin strings that likely originated from one of Greenwich's many vintage shops, she twirls her keyring around one thumb, the other hand balanced on her hip. There is not a cast in sight. This makes Jean quite a happy panda all by itself, all things considered.
"Coming!" Norah hollars, finishing putting the last bit of dough on the tray, but not bothering putting it into the oven. There's already a stack of cookies that are on a drying rack on the countertop nearby, filling the air with chocolatey goodness. She checks the peephole, like a good New York resident ought to, and then unbolts the door to let Jean in. "Hey there," she says, more cheerfully than most people great their landladies. "Come on in. What do you think?"
Jean is not a difficult landlady to be cheerful to, greeting Norah with a bright smile that on someone less WASPishly raised and a high-sensitivity telepath to boot would take the form of a hug. "Hey there yourself," she greets as she steps in, the keys vanishing into the pocket of her jeans. "And I -thought- I smelled fresh paint. Looks... good," she appraises. "Not what I'd have done, obviously, but I think it suits you a lot better than retro industrial."
"It's very bright," Norah admits, shutting the door behind Jean and turning to look at the walls, fists shoved into her pockets. She's not much of a hugger, either, so she's just fine with the distance. "And not too expertly done, but I'll cope. I had a friend help me paint; he'd never painted a wall before. You can kinda tell the section he did. I'm mostly just glad to be finished with the walls. The neighbors were getting sick of the smell of paint."
"They initially had to deal with the sound of sledgehammers, crowbars and a floor sander, when I first bought the place," Jean shares, with a crooked smile and a bit of old memory. "God, you should have seen it -- which is why, I think, I was able to pick it up for within my price range without having to tap mutual funds to begin with. Walls up all over the place, pink shag carpet..."
Norah laughs. "And you didn't keep the carpet?" she asks, feigning outrage. "I could've used that!" She can't really sell that joke, though, as her laugh turns into a wince at the idea. "Yuck. Well, it's very nice, now, so you did a good job. Go ahead and take a seat." She gestures towards the lackluster furniture. "Want anything to drink? Or cookies? I made them to smooth things over with my neighbors after the days of paint fumes, but it looks like there's going to be a bazillion extra."
"The neighbours should just be glad that you're less likely to result in imminent Humvee dropping than I am," Jean quips, eyes crinked at the corners as she sidles over to the sturdiest-looking of the near chairs, and perches herself upon it. "Incidentally, in case you got a copy of that letter too, I'm not going to be raising your rent. The fee increase is ridiculous and entirely political, and I don't intend to let it trickle down to you... cookies?" Jean's activist outrage, however politely articulate, can be sidetracked by offerings of baked goods it appears.
"Cookies it is, then," Norah says, laughing. "And thanks." She pauses in the kitchen, getting a plate and some cups and a gallon of milk. "A humvee dropping?" She glances over quickly towards Jean, eyebrows drawn together briefly. "Did something like that actually happen? My friend who helped me paint made a joke about an SUV through the window of this place because of all the mutant /stuff/ going on nearby, but even having attended Strange Mutant Happenings 101, that seemed a little out there to me."
"Well..." says Jean, and then trails off, a look of off-kilter humour twinkling her eyes and curving one corner of her mouth. "If you really -want- the story, I was the Humvee's intended target in a way, so I -could- be bribed with further cookies into sharing."
"Oh my hell," Norah says with abrupt, but amused surprise. "So that happened to you. You live the wierdest life of anybody probably /ever/. And yes, I want the story, and of course you can have as many cookies as you can eat." A full dozen cookies make it onto the plate, held in one hand. Her other hand holds a gallon of milk from the index finger and holds two plastic cups in the crook of the elbow. Somehow, everything manages to make it in front of Jean without incident.
The lack of incident may or may not be due to Jean sitting up alert and with telekinesis at the ready, just in case. She assists with lessening the burden of milk and cookies, and a pleasant pause in conversation to ensure pouring and parcelling out ensues. Only once she has demonstrated that happiness is indeed a cookie in each hand does she begin again. "Well, I'd -like- to be perfectly uninteresting, but I suspect it's just not in the cards... but let's see. Now, you went to Xavier's, so you no doubt know the history, about how Magneto used to teach there before he decided to run off and be a terrorist. He occasionally still drops in on me for reasons unknown, usually at the worst possible times. This particular time, I'd, ah, had Professor Logan over, and he was still sleeping while I caught a shower before work."
"And he decided to do it with a humvee," Norah says, laughing. "That's ... attention-getting. But I guess we all already know about his propensity for dramatic gestures." She shakes her head, a little disbelieving. "I would have paid /good money/ to see Professor Logan's reaction to that -- but also to be far away in a safe bunker." She grabs a cookie herself, but just one. She's already had plenty of the dough.
"Oh, the Humvee part came later," Jean admits, and nibbles delicately upon one of her cookies, drawing her legs up beneath her to sit cross-legged as she does so. "You see, he and Logan really don't get along, surprise surprise, and when you're a terrorist and an aging asshole with magnetic powers, and you see someone with a metal skeleton... suffice it to say that I came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel to find my boyfriend hovering midair in pain. So I threw Magneto out of here, and, um, neglected to open the balcony door first. He disliked that, hence the Humvee."
"Oh," Norah says, absorbing that information. "Well, that hardly seems like a proportionate reaction. A small scooter, maybe I could justify. A humvee's just going over the line." She chuckles at the thought and shakes her head, still letting her brain process the information. And makes a mental note to ask Logan, from whom she'll probably get a more colorful description, possibly full of swears. "So, um... sorry to change the subject -- this one's very entertaining -- but my friend who helped me paint, he mentioned that he sort of knew you. You happen to know an Adel al-something?"
"It's so hard to find bad guys with a sense of taste and restraint, these days," agrees Jean with a mock-sigh, abruptly cut off at the mention of "Adel al-Razi?" and paired with a narrowing of her eyes. "Yes, I know him. I know his brother Bahir better, though -- Bahir used to be one of my grad students over in my lab."
The narrowed eyes are apparently not the reaction Norah was expecting to get, for she pauses, growing more serious. "I haven't met Bahir -- just his cat." She lets out a sigh at the memory, rubbing at the bridge of her nose with a finger. "Anyway. We've been kind of -- not dating, really, but mostly just flirting and joking around. I just can't get a read off of him for what type of person he really is, though, and I figured since he mentioned at least having met you, and you're a decent judge of character..." She trails off, curiously.
"I judge..." Jean trails off, and bites into her cookie while she gathers her thoughts. "I judge that while Bahir is the more outwardly prickly, he's the better twin underneath. Be careful around Adel," she bids. "He runs with some interesting company." Because somehow Bahir does not? Do not question the Jean.
"Too late for careful," Norah says ruefully, a smile tugging at one corner of her mouth. She rearranges herself in her seat, bringing up one knee to her chest and resting her elbow on top of it. "Funny story, here, actually. Horribly, horribly embarrassing and awkward, but funny. You want to hear it? I just barely developed a sense of humor about the whole thing, like, and hour ago."
"Oh dear," says Jean and, having finished one cookie, reaches for the milk in case Norah somehow magically needs a top-up of her glass this early on. "Well, having shared my towel-clad terrorist flinging tale, I think it's only fair that I listen to yours."
Norah takes a drink of her milk before pushing it over for Jean to top off. "All right. No judging, though. Only commiserating." She smiles, and then leans back to tell the tale. "So, I have this thing -- it's new, my roommates at school corrupted me -- where I get tempted to do things that would be funny, even if they're really, really stupid. I just have a hard time resisting a good joke. So last night, I was just out walking when I noticed Adel on his way home. And decided to follow him there, invisibly, so I could pull a couple pranks on him. It's a lot easier to break and enter if you just follow the person inside. And I wasn't going to do anything /mean/ -- just take off his doorknobs and put them back on backwards, move the fridge handle to the other side of the door, maybe a little boullion in the shower head. Fun stuff."
"Oh my," says Jean, in another WASPish pronouncement, before topping off the glass and then setting the pitcher down, the better to sip slowly from her own. "I take it from you sitting here that it at least didn't end up with a B&E charge?"
"No, thank God," says Norah, laughing with a bit of relief. "But he did back up suddenly just as he was getting in the door and bumped into me. And then I tripped, and fell, and banged my knee. It hurt, so I swore. I tried to just pretend that I wasn't there and he'd imagined it all, but his brother's cat kept sniffing at me, pointing out where I was." She shakes her head, and laughs at herself. "It was one of the most awkward moments of my life. I didn't know whether to go visible and fess up -- I mean, he was going to find out eventually that I was a mutant -- or just try to keep hiding and hope he didn't call the mutant squad and have them search." She shrugs. "I decided to 'fess up. I really freaked the poor guy out." Or so she thinks, at least. "At least he's not a rabid anti-mutant type, right? I just have to buy him dinner sometime, to make up."
"Ah, no," says Jean, with an odd little smile and no explanation for it. "I think we can say that Adel is safely not anti-mutant. Although... be careful. And be especially careful of letting him hand you anything with strings attached. But if you do that, well, I'm sure he can be a lot of fun to hang out with."
"There's something you're not telling me," Norah says, noting Jean's smile with a raised, suspicious eyebrow. "Any chance I could wheedle it out of you with more cookies?" She leans over, pushing the plate slightly towards Jean with her fingertips. "He is fun, though. We mostly invent pretend scenarios where he's the ruler of the civilized world and I'm his unauthorized biographer/executive assistant who's the real power behind the throne. That's my version, anyway."
"I'm debating whether I should keep his confidences, or whether I put you at risk by doing so," Jean admits, one corner of her mouth quirking again. "But I'm not entirely sure he's not actually intending on ruling the civilized world. I hope you'll encourage things towards benevolent dictatorship, if so," she quips, and favours Norah with a wink.
"And now that just sounds ominous," says Norah, genuinely puzzled. "But I am, in general, opposed to very much risk -- except when things are funny, as I mentioned. Or if it's a sudden impulse and I don't take time to think things through." She then laughs. "Oh, yes, it's a very benevolent dictatorship. Mostly the sort that lives secluded on a tropical island and doesn't worry too much about the nitty-gritty of political life, leaving that in the hands of our carefully vetted appointees. But there would certainly be no persecution of inocents or anything like that, and poverty would be all but vanquished due to sheer willpower."
"He's a telepath," says Jean to that rather suddenly, having apparently spent the cheery rundown of banana republics lost in thought. "He's taken lessons from Professor Xavier, but he's also taken lessons from someone who is of the opinion that if God didn't want her meddling with people's minds, then He wouldn't have given her telepathy. I can't honestly say where his ethics will come down, in regards to you."
"What?" Norah asks. She heard Jean perfectly, of course, it's just a reaction of non-understanding. She holds up a hand, indicating that she needs a moment of silence to give herself some mental space to work things through. Her expression flickers between surprise, anger, and disbelief. It settles on disbelief long enough for her to speak. "He can't -- are you serious? He let me babble my way through the one of the most embarrassing half hours of my life to date, pretending to be all wierded out that I was a mutant, and he's one too? You're not joking."
"He was hardly going to out himself to you, Norah -- telepaths are the one mutant even other mutants fear, and I know it well." Despite the revalation, Jean seems hardly happy with herself for making it, and nurses her milk and cookies for a time. "But... I can't trust his grasp on ethics. Especially not since he's probably figured out that you're a former student of mine, and thus a potential handle on me, or the school." The second cookie's remains disappar again, before she admits that "On the other hand, he may just be entertained by you, and I've gone and outed him for no real good reason. This goes no farther, all right?"
"You've got a point, there," Norah admits, disgruntled. Damn reason and ethics getting in her face when she really wants to get angry. "Still, he could've made me feel better without outing himself. Also, I think what I mistook for nervous laughter was just him laughing /at/ me." She regards the ceiling with an irritated air. "I can't decide whether that makes him an asshole or whther that was a really, really good counter-prank. To a prank I didn't even get to do!" She then turns her gaze back to Jean and nods, seriously. "Yeah, it goes no farther. I do appreciate knowing, though. Maybe it'll help keep me from doing something stupid later on."
"Oh, I'm comfortably sure he's an asshole," Jean assures, and relaxes slightly, settling more comfortably into her seat and taking a long sip of her milk that drains the glass down to the midpoint. "But he's also intelligent, witty and driven in his ambitious, as well as quite pretty to look at. You could do worse, for friends."
Norah laughs, long and easy, leaning back in her chair and relaxing also. "See, /that's/ what I was looking for earlier when I asked for a character assessment. Intelligent, witty, driven, asshole. And yes, he is nice to look at." She turns her glass of milk in her hands, regarding it thoughtfully. "Good to know." There's a quiet, sober moment before the younger woman abruptly changes topics, opting to pick Jean's brain about the techniques of wrangling teenagers and swap stories rather than dwell on further relationship drah-ma.
Norah learns a little somethin' about her partner in world domination.
X-Men: Movieverse 2 - Wednesday, May 14, 2008, 11:28 PM
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=XS= The Roof - Xavier's School
Through a small little door accessed from the attic, one may stand or sit out here on a flat section of the mansion's roof on cool summer evenings, or anytime really, to think. Most of the mansion's grounds can be viewed from here as well as Westchester on, beautiful in the spring and fall when all things are blooming anew or the earthy, patchwork quilt of autumn lays across the land. Visible in the distance is the city skyline of New York. Over by the gardens, a tall oak tree boasts a treehouse in its branches. Someone feeling adventurous could probably jump and make it...
[This room is set watchable. Use alias XSRoof to watch here.]
[Exits : [J]ump and [B]ack [I]nside]
[Players : Storm ]
With the return of a Storm to the mansion, Jean's excursions up to the rooftop are no longer solely for purposes of sneaking cigarettes. Indeed, more often than not, one can find a -friend- up here. Thus Jean, still dressed from a day in the city, if slightly more rumpled after returning home for requisite cuddling involving Nate Grey-Summers and Yertle the Turtle, has emerged up onto the roof with a heave of the heavy door and a brief whuff of effort. She has thrown off the tyrrany of shoes, and is padding in stocking-feet, one hand holding a pitcher of something and a pair of stacked cups in the crok of her elbow.
Ororo has also thrown off the tyranny of shoes, although this is not unusual. She sits cross-legged on the roof in the gathering dusk, slowly falling into the regularity of after-dinner ritual; but she is not really doing anything with her powers up here. Really, she's not doing anything much at all, besides sitting there, informal in jeans and a shirt of soft cream embroidered with yellow roses. But the whuff of effort and the opening door draw her attention, and she cants her head, turning to smile at her friend with the quiet warmth of welcome. She says, "Jean."
Jean says "Daquiris". This, it seems, is not a correction but rather an explanation, for the pitcher full of a promisingly fruity looking slush is hefted in tandem with it. The winds of a spring night may be chilly and not conducive to daquiri drinking, but that's hardly a reason to give up on a perfectly good tradition. "I just got back from a rather scientifically eventful day in town," she shares in further explanation as she settles neatly on a flat spot of the roof. "How's things back here at the ranch?"
"Quiet ... reasonably quiet, anyway." Ororo turns a tolerant smile out over the grounds, and lifts a hand to tuck a few stray silver-white hairs behind one ear, before she scoots back a ways over the surface of the roof to sit a little closer to her friend. "Daiquiris sound like an excellent conclusion to a not at all bad day. What's going on in science world?"
"Oh, working with Bahir al-Razi in what is probably a deal with the devil to see how a QuikID machine works," says Jean with a sigh as she settles and sets out the cups. "We've come away with some useful discoveries on what it can and cannot get a positive reading off of, which has led to some theories about just what it's testing for." Despite this promising news, Jean's smile slips away into abstraction midway through pouring the drinks in a way that can't entirely be written off to concentration.
Storm tips her head, pressing her thumb to her brow with the slight downturn of a frown as she watches the blended drinks pour into the cups. The name stirs an old unease, not due to any mistrust Ororo bears for the telepath, but for the memories that whisper at the back of her brain, debts owed that she'd rather not even be aware of. Her gaze lowered, she makes a "hmm" sort of noise through the press of her lips. "You think you are on the road to learning something useful, then?" she asks softly, her gaze flicking back up to find Jean's face, and noting the turn of her friend's expression. "Are you all right? Feeling that Faustian?"
"It feels like I'm putting together a jigsaw someone else has done, except they broke it up and threw away the box after," Jean admits, sounding not nearly as exasperated at this challenge as might be sensible. Her first sip of daiquiri runs a shiver through her at the chill of it, and results in her suit's blazer being pulled more firmly about herself. Silence then, and a bit of a wait for the answer to the real question asked. "Oddly enough," says Jean, "It's not the Faustian angle of this that has me thinking. It's more wondering how much more I could be doing, if I could focus my all on the problem." There is another pause, paired with the flick of a stray pebble from the roofing gravel with one toe. "With any of the problems," she concludes.
"Ah." Ororo breathes out in a low laugh, the sound soft and warm. She shakes her head slightly and lifts her drink to match Jean sip for sip, although the temperature (unsurprisingly) does not appear to have much of an effect on her one way or another. "You do what you can, where you can, Jean. It's more than a lot of people could offer."
"I do sometimes wonder if I'm doing more harm than good, holding down spots that others could fill more completely," reflects Jean, suggesting that by 'sometimes' she means 'now'. Another sip of daiquiri is taken. Braced for the chill of it, Jean doesn't shiver this time. "I really do envy that you went over to Africa and devoted yourself to a single cause for so many months," she admits, serious and smiling and proud all at once.
"In a way it was selfish of me, Jean." Ororo gives her a slight smile, crooked with rue, and then lowers her eyes again as she takes another small swallow of her daiquiri. "I learned a lot ... about balance. Everything I do changes something, something even beyond what I mean it to... And in going away from here, I may have gone to do good things for the world. But I also /left/."
"And, outside of college, when have you ever left before?" Jean wonders, tipping her chin slightly. "I took my sabbatical, much grief that it brought me in the end. Why shouldn't you have taken one too?"
"I suppose." Ororo's thumb brushes down the curve of her cheek-bone as her other hand roofs contemplatively over the cup, resting on her knee. "But it is good that I've returned, I think." Then she smiles a little brighter, and glances up at Jean with a lift of her brows. "And I don't think you should beat yourself about the head for choosing balance over focus."
"Oh, not the -head-." Eyes widened dramatically, Jean looks a picture of horror. "I -need- that. But... I -do- want to find a way to free up enough time to make at least a concerted push here or there. Like the sign war."
Ororo grins. "Ahh," she says, the sound extending on a low note, and she takes a longer swallow of her daiquiri. "There, I think we might devise a concerted plan of attack, Dr. Grey. -- If ... Charles would be probably disappointed," she allows, "if we ended up in jail."
"We would just have to make sure it was a misdemeanour, not a felony," Jean decides, with a careful lift of a finger and a solemn sip of her drink. Her hand trembles, along with the rest of her, as the slenderness of her frame informs the rest of her that it is -not- designed to conserve heat, -thank- you. "Or possibly... hrm. Try what poor Marieta Elliott did, but with the ability to keep idiots from throwing bricks through windows? And with just us?"
"I do think it would be difficult to find mutants more well-known than us," Ororo says very wryly, closing her eyes over the slight crinkle of her nose. The breeze that whispers against Jean's face is not a cool one, but one that suggests distant heat: the temperature rises, just enough to be noticeable. Ororo does not feel the cold, but she is close enough to sense shivering and know what it means.
Jean's expression would be one at home on any lizard given a taste of warmth. Eye closed, she lets the heat kiss her cheeks and lets a slow smile spread out as warmth follows along her limbs. "It needs," she notes, "To be summer. But in the meantime, God I missed having you around. And did I tell you that the Bay Horse is one of the bars with signs up?" she wonders, far from innocently as her eyes open again.
Ororo makes a wordless noise in the back of her throat, something like a growl. She shakes back her hair with a flick of her wrist. "The Bay Horse," she says, and narrows a thoughtful look at Jean for that lack of innocence.
"Indeed," says Jean, head canted slightly sideways. "A cop and firefighter haunt, I do believe. Chris goes there. We'd most -definitely- get noticed."
"Oh," Ororo says, and a laugh catches in her voice like a snag in velvet. "Poor Chris."
"I believe we should -talk- to the management," Jean predicts, with a look of utter virtue and righteous innocence. She lifts her daiquiri glass as if it were some sacramental chalice. "From inside. Persistently."
Ororo lifts her own cup in one hand and turns it, eyeing it with a thoughtful, contemplative air. "I believe," she says, at length, "that this sounds like a plan."
"Saturday night, you think?" Jean wonders, pursing her lips after a halthy swallow of her drink. "I've heard they have -special- cells for we mutant freaks. We wouldn't even have to have drooling drunks sleeping on us."
Ororo lifts a hand, and the wind rushes over them both, pulling through their hair as the white mist curls through Ororo's eyes, lending an eerie note to the crook of her wicked smile. "It's a date, Jean."
Jean has only one answer to this: a very solemn "Cheers," and a nod of her head. With a rapid third of her daiquiri now inside of her, she sighs with a moment's borrowed ease and sinks back into a seat with her hands and elbows propping her and her drink hovering delicately in the air before her. "I missed you,"
"I missed you, too." Ororo's reply comes in a low murmur, and she takes a long swallow of her daiquiri, before relaxing into the quiet of long-lost companionship under the open sky.
Ororo and Jean have a cunning plan!