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Post by Rogue on Dec 9, 2006 2:21:40 GMT
Upon hearing that Bobby had been recovered mostly-safely, and that John had been brought back as well, Rogue had wanted to go in and see them right away. She’d waited, though, letting there be time for them to rest. And time for her to try to get used to the strangely hollow mindscape she was left with.
It’s weird how quiet it is, without the dull chatter overlaying everything. Odd, how earlier she’d been annoyed by it. Now…she doesn’t like the silence, the way it’s so empty. Frighteningly so. She feels too alone. So that’s what finally gets her to go seek out the two in the med lab, the loneliness. Because someone has to be down there, even if neither are awake, and she just…needs to be around people right now. Anyone will do, but preferably someone familiar.
Of course, she doesn’t expect the rush of combined fear, joy, and grief that shoot through her as she catches sight of them – alive.. She’s standing in the doorway, and she notices absently that she’s shaking. It’s totally irrational, because of course they’re alive. Unless they’re not, and they’ll disappear, and she’ll have imagined it all…
John's awake, or at least he looks that way, while Bobby’s either asleep or unconscious...Hopefully okay, though. She doesn’t know what really happened there, so she doesn’t know just how bad he’s hurt, but she doesn’t want to disturb him.
It’s perfectly logical that she’s over near John in seconds, and giving him a careful, but impulsive hug, and crying, though. Perfectly logical. He’s alive, and somehow that’s a shock, even though she knows full well that of course he is, he’s the real one. And, sure, she should be at least a little mad at him, but she’ll worry about that later.
[Johnny, Bobby, come plaaay!]
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Post by Pyro on Dec 9, 2006 3:12:45 GMT
John’s counting the ceiling tiles for something which feels like the millionth time when Rogue makes her entrance. There’s not much by way of diversion in the med-lab, but he has to distract himself somehow; Bobby’s asleep (though he doubts things would be any easier if he were awake, save that the silences would be awkward rather than just empty)… he of course doesn’t have any sort of lighter to toy with, let alone the one he’s craving… and he has to do something to fill up the headspace which would otherwise be taken over by awkward questions and general self-flagellation. And even crappy distraction is enough to keep him from noticing anything much beyond the fact that the door has creaked open before she’s at the bedside and re-arranging what remains of his ribs.
He’s never been a particularly touchy-feely person (that brief, odd period when he and Bobby were all cuddly-schmoopy non withstanding) and so there’s an understandable Ah! Get off! tension beneath the more obvious wince, but… fuck it, he needs a hug. Not that he deserves one, of course. But it feels good, and he’s not going to turn it down because it’s not like there are going to be many moments of anything this friendly for quite a while, given what he’s done and where he is.
”Hey” he says, once he gets his breath back (and no, fuck it, those are not tears anywhere in his voice – he hasn’t broken yet and isn’t going to in front of her) ”S’good to know someone doesn’t hate me”
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Post by Rogue on Dec 9, 2006 3:31:29 GMT
Yeah, really him. She shouldn’t need to reassure herself of that repeatedly, but she does, somehow, because it’s like he shouldn’t be here. Anywhere, really. But, no, real. Or a really good illusion, that’s actually solid and warm, and speaking.
”Hey. S’good to know someone doesn’t hate me”
She shakes her head a little, but doesn’t move just yet, though she forces her tears to stop, because she doesn’t want to creep him out, or anything, especially when she’s got no real reason to be crying.
“’Course not. If y’weren’t hurt, I’d hit y’, though, f’doin’ somethin’ that stupid…”
Wait, which one does she mean? His hiding the information she needed, or kidnapping Bobby..? Both, she decides. And doesn’t she have every right to blame him for the fact that Template got out and killed them all in the first place…?
No, wait. Not him. The other John...Separating the two shouldn’t be hard at all. One’s real, here, alive. The other was never really real in the first place. All in her head. She can’t blame John for what his psyke did, or vice versa.
She draws back to look at him, and offers a smile, wiping at her eyes with one hand. “…Sorry. Did I hurt ya?”
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Post by Bobby Drake on Dec 9, 2006 20:25:15 GMT
> " ’Course not. If y’weren’t hurt, I’d hit y’, though, f’doin’ somethin’ that stupid…"
The sound of Marie’s voice drags Bob into the waking world, not entirely willingly. He’s a little surprised to realize he was actually asleep, instead of just pretending to be to avoid having to talk to John – whose bright idea was it to put them in adjacent beds like this, anyway? – but supposes that between the painkillers he’s on and the amount of healing his body has to do, he’s likely to be sleeping a lot for the next week or so.
Not to mention whatever side-effects year-old Cure has, the unhelpful part of his mind reminds him. It’s true, though… Bob’s actually surprised that Magneto had any of the stuff, given how low the shelf-life of the mass-produced stuff turned out to be, but nobody has any idea what the effects of Cure this old might be. It might wear off tomorrow. It might kill him. Who knows?
At least, Bob hopes it’s the leftover stuff – the alternative is that Magneto has his hands on Jimmy, which Bob doesn’t even want to think about. Officially, Jimmy vanished after Alcatraz – well, after the first Alcatraz – but Bob’s pretty sure Storm set him up with a foster-family somewhere under a fake ID. He doesn’t want to know; the less anybody knows the better, and Bob has no illusions anymore about his ability to resist torture. If Bob had known Jimmy’s location and Magneto had wanted to find out, he’d know it… and wouldn’t hesitate to use him the same way Warren’s dad and the military did.
> " Sorry. Did I hurt ya? "
The question puzzles Bob for a moment, before he realizes it was addressed to John. Figures. Even after everything, she’s still… The thought fades, uncompleted, and Bob is somewhat surprised to realize he just doesn’t care. It’s a strange feeling, like finally putting weight on an ankle you’ve been favoring for weeks to discover it doesn’t hurt anymore, and it makes him actually aware for the first time just how uncomfortable their weird little threesome thing has always been for him, and of just how much of a kid he’s been about it.
About a lot of things, really. Well… guess it’s time to grow up.
He tries to sit up, lies back down at the subsequent dizziness, then tries it again more successfully. "Hey," he waves, trying for a light friendly tone and mostly managing it, " What’s a guy gotta do to get some service in this joint, anyway?"
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Post by Pyro on Dec 10, 2006 1:45:55 GMT
< If y’weren’t hurt, I’d hit y’, though, f’doin’ somethin’ that stupid [/color]
”You’d have to join the queue… ‘been overdoing the ‘stupid’ lately” John tries for a wry edge and a half-joke, and sort of manages it, finding it surprisingly easy to slip back into easy snark-ism around her. Almost as if things were still the way they were before he left, really, which makes the whole argument about how difficult it’s going to be coming back… No, stop it. Not now. Plenty of time to agonize over all that later.
< Sorry. Did I hurt ya?[/color]
Stock dismissive gesture? Check. Customary what, hurt me? Don’t be stupid expression and tone? Check, check. ”Course not.”
Rogue was never, after all, the only untouchable one in their twisted trinity. Just the one who didn’t have to remind everyone of that fact.
John shifts slightly, making room for her to take a seat on the bed next to him. It’s odd to even begin thinking he hasn’t changed, because he was always the volatile, shifting one in the triangle…. But some nagging unhelpful voice is determined that something about her is different. She seems… flatter, somehow. Smaller. Which is, the rest of him points out, a stupid comment because of course she’d be deflated by recent events. Everyone is… and she’s got more reason to be than most. Even if he can’t quite understand why she still gives a damn what happens to him, the fact Bobby got hurt had to be all sorts of horrible for her…
< What’s a guy gotta do to get some service in this joint, anyway?
Speak of the devil… Despite Ororo’s reassurances that Bobby would be fine it’s good to actually hear that he’s still there… and the rush of embarrassment he bites back at being *caught* with Rogue is another mark in the *just like always* column, though of course the reasoning has changed, and is in any case skewed since it’s fairly certain neither of them have anything to be *cheating* on now…
And that hurts, sure. It’s a dull dead ache now, though, rather than a stab, something he’s partway resigned himself to, this *shift* which means anything other than a relieved ”Welcome back to the land of the living” is somehow suddenly inappropriate when before it would never have been enough. And sure, he might be getting ahead of himself, but it’s better to wait on Bobby’s say-so as to the state of play because realistically he’s not going to suggest things are still like that between them, is he?
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Post by Rogue on Dec 10, 2006 2:27:04 GMT
”You’d have to join the queue… ‘been overdoing the ‘stupid’ lately”
She nods, in complete agreement, with what passes for a grin right now.“Yeah, y'sure have. Jus’ try not ta do tha’ anymore.”
”Course not.”
She eyes him a moment, then nods. “’Kay, good.” She’s not sure she entirely believes him, but she obviously didn’t hurt him that bad – she’d tried to be careful, anyhow. As he moves, she takes a seat, which puts her in the position where she can see Bobby stirring, waking up.
"Hey. What’s a guy gotta do to get some service in this joint, anyway?"[/color]
Bobby’s a totally different issue than John – the old Bobby, the one she really knew, is gone for good now. Entirely. There’s no possible way to get him back, reality or psyke…which brings in a whole separate kind of grief. She’s torn between going over and giving him a hug as well, and not, because she’s not sure he’ll like that anymore…But she gets up and goes to his side, giving him a careful hug as well, because, da*nit, she’d been scared for him. And he’s still Bobby.
When she moves back, standing between the two, she shoots a look to both of them, absently fidgeting with her gloves, trying to hide the fact that she’s still shaking, and she can’t quite keep her tone totally even and neutral when she speaks. “You two ever scare m’like tha’ again…”
She leaves it open, because she’s not sure what she’d do, or how to finish it. Threatening seems entirely wrong, because she couldn’t hurt either of them, ever. Especially not now that they’re all that she has left…and no, she can’t keep going on that train of thought, not without crying. So she won’t. Topic change…
“Y’all need anythin’?”
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Post by Bobby Drake on Dec 10, 2006 4:16:03 GMT
> " Welcome back to the land of the living "
"Yeah, thanks. Over-rated, I think." Bob nods curtly to John and grins at Marie: "Y’know, we really have to stop meeting like this. Thanks for visiting, though… Storm isn’t letting me out of here ‘till the shoulder sets, or knits, or whatever the hell a dislocated shoulder is supposed to do. " He shrugs one-armed. "It’s good to see people."
He frowns, then, looking Marie over more carefully. "Hey, are you OK? You seem… I dunno. Different. "
He can’t identify the difference at first, just something about the way she walks, the way she stands, it’s all subtly off. It takes him a moment to realize he’s seen this before, when she’s picked up new ‘psykes’ she hasn’t yet assimilated. It was particularly bad after the Congress mission, when Template got nailed… and, he realizes with the sensation of a lightbulb going on over his head, Marie did just return from fighting the Brotherhood at Neverland.
"Oh, " he says, feeling somewhat dumb. "I get it. So… who was it? I mean, who is it, in there? " He waves vaguely in the direction of her head. "Bobby Jr. isn’t giving you any trouble, is he. Tell ‘im I’ll get Josh to telepathically whup his ass if he is…"
It feels good, a little, being able to banter with Marie again. He hasn’t really been able to for a long time… he’s not sure how long, really. Looking back on it, it seems he’s been anxious about one thing or another forever, especially when it came to Marie and John. All that’s gone now, and he’s relieved. (Really. He doesn’t miss the old Bobby at all. He used to complicate everything so much! It’s simpler, this way. And that empty feeling in his chest is probably just hunger.)
He shivers a little, and blinks in surprise... something else he's going to have to get used to. "Do you think you can get them to raise the thermostat a little? It's cold in here..."
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Post by Rogue on Dec 10, 2006 5:11:02 GMT
"Y’know, we really have to stop meeting like this. Thanks for visiting, though… Storm isn’t letting me out of here ‘till the shoulder sets, or knits, or whatever the hell a dislocated shoulder is supposed to do. It’s good to see people."
“No problem.” She smiles slightly sympathetically, “Hopefully y’all can heal up an’ b’outta here quick.”
She doesn’t mention she agrees wholeheartedly with the sentiment of it being good to see people, though, even though she does. It’s good to feel at least a little less alone, though the fact that she does feel alone even while she’s in the same room with her two best friends is a little disturbing. Ignoring it, though. She can deal with it later. It’ll just take getting used to, right? Besides, next time she touches someone…
Touch. Right. She could just…
No way did she just think that. No. They’re hurt, and she could hurt them worse, and just…no. Even thinking of that can’t be good, and she spares a glance at her gloved hands just long enough to reassure herself she’s covered.
"Hey, are you OK? You seem… I dunno. Different…. Oh, I get it. So… who was it? I mean, who is it, in there? Bobby Jr. isn’t giving you any trouble, is he. Tell ‘im I’ll get Josh to telepathically whup his ass if he is…"[/color]
That’s enough to break the fragile hold she has over herself, at this point. She knows he doesn’t know, couldn’t possibly know, how what he said would effect her, because the only person who knew what happened in her head is Josh, and she’s not sure he even entirely understands what she’s left with. Her eyes drop to the floor, and she’s shaking uncontrollably, and she can’t hold her tears off anymore, though she’s not really paying attention enough to really care if she’s crying or not.
”They’re gone.”
And, yeah, that’s almost certainly not a good enough explanation, she knows, but it’s the best she can form at the moment. Everything’s wrong – but at the same time, no, it’s not, because they’re both there, really alive, and not figments of her imagination… That should be comfort enough. It’s not, though. Somehow, it’s as serious a wound as if she’d lost one – or both – of them for real.
She only vaguely hears, and notes, the mention of the thermostat, and there's a small part of her that recognizes that as an odd request for him - but all that is only a minor thought that she can't quite connect with any action whatsoever at the moment.
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Post by Pyro on Dec 12, 2006 19:44:32 GMT
He’s got no reason to feel hard done by, really. Not after what he’s done, not with things how they stand… But it’s hard not to let any of that get to him – the way all he seems to merit is a curt nod next to that grin, or the fact that she shifts over to Bobby’s side. It’s almost like being the third wheel again, only far more complicated, because none of them really have any claim on each other any more (except that they do… but that’s way too twisted to get his head around just yet), the old triangular politics only this time with bells on. He wonders vaguely when he got so damn possessive, and who exactly it’s directed towards, and abandons all that because it makes his head spin in a way which has nothing to do with the drugs lingering in his system or his physical state and besides, it’s sickening how like a spoiled brat he’s sounding…
So it pointedly doesn’t bother him that Bobby’s the one to pick up on what’s wrong with her, while he should be smacking himself for missing it because dealing with psyche-fallout was always his thing. And he doesn’t feel anything when Bobby mentions the thermostat, because that wasn’t his fault and he’s not going to be made to feel as if it was. Nope. Nothing there. Nada. He’s just the same John he always was and nothing those two do is going to…
< They’re gone[/color]
Okay, spoke too soon The way Rogue’s shaking is enough to break through that practiced indifference even before what she’s saying actually sinks in. And it doesn’t make much sense… Who’s gone, exactly? The psykes? Surely that’s a good thing, isn’t it? All the voices in her head ever did was give her nightmares and nag at her and…
… ah, right. And define pretty much everything she ever was, really. So it’s obvious that losing that would mess things up for her (pretty much the same way losing his powers would him… though he only allows himself to note that briefly because the whole issue of being depowered is obviously kinda raw).
He’s unsure whether he should make any sort of move until he realizes how stupid it is to still be waiting on a cue from Bob as to whether it’s alright… It never bugged him before, did it? And no, nothing ever really happened, and yes, things have changed since then, but they should be less rather than more complicated, at least as far as issues of possession and boundaries go at least. It was never Bob who dealt with this side of the *knight in shining armor* thing (though John, both then and now, would probably roast anyone who drew that comparison), the bit where it wasn’t all sweet and romantic… and so all the questions of what’s and where’s and why’s can be left to him because he obviously won’t understand – either what’s going on or that talking doesn’t help much.
John’s not sure why he stops at the thermostat en route – were it an issue right now, he’d probably put it down to his own apparent cold-bloodedness, but as it stands it’s relatively unimportant and can be ignored – but at least the hug itself is simple. Hang that it’s *not something he does* (at least, not in front of people); if something’s changed it might as well be that. Besides, it’s not like it’s an awkward or embarrassing hug. If anything it’s more of a restraining one, like he’s physically trying to hold all her pieces together. It’s odd that this – not Ororo asking, not him accepting, and, he suspects, not even breaking the news to Bob – should be when it starts to feel like coming home.
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Post by Bobby Drake on Dec 12, 2006 22:16:29 GMT
> " They’re gone. "
At another moment, in another conversation, Bob might have correctly understood her. Here and now, with his thoughts too wrapped up in his own condition to pay too much attention to anyone else’s, he misunderstands completely.
It doesn’t surprise him that Marie knows his powers are gone… he’s shivering, for one thing, but more importantly Bob figures the news has probably made its way around the Institute twice by now while he’s been sleeping it off.
It does surprise him a little that she’s so broken up about it… sure, it sucks, but she’s acting like she’s lost her best friend.
Well, maybe she has, a snide little voice in the back of his head suggests. Maybe she’s like Magneto and Sherridan and the rest of that crowd, figures a mere ‘sapiens’ like you isn’t worth associating with anymore. He dismisses that thought almost as soon as it forms, a little horrified that it even occurred to him… he’ll be the first to admit he never really understood Marie even when they were dating, but he knows her well enough to know that prejudice isn’t one she’d consider.
So why is she so bent out of shape about my power-loss? And Marie, of all people, who was the poster-child for voluntary Cure treatments not six months ago. Something isn’t right, here. It seems to Bob he’s been saying that more or less nonstop since John unlocked his cage... a few hours ago? Can that be right? It feels like forever.
It’s even more confusing when John drags himself off his bed and catches Marie up in a tight, supportive hug… apparently whatever it is that’s setting her off, John’s in on the secret.
That would have bugged him, once. Now it’s almost a relief… no, scratch the ‘almost.’ It is a relief (he insists to himself). Hell, they’ve tried out both John and Marie as the unattached third, and both John and Marie as the powerless ones, and it didn’t stick. Maybe, he thinks to himself, it really should’ve been me all along.
"Yeah," he finally replies, though by now it hardly seems necessary for him to say anything at all. "They’re gone."
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Post by Rogue on Dec 13, 2006 2:29:26 GMT
She shouldn’t feel this broken.
Not over this, not over anything. She shouldn’t feel like she’s so helpless, like she’s so alone, especially knowing full well that she’s not; no more so than she ever was, not really. Less, if anything...they're both here. Home. Safe. Alive. That should make it all okay.
She’s a little disoriented, and it seems sudden when she finds herself engulfed in a comforting embrace, one she recognizes as John’s, though she doesn’t bother to look up, and isn’t totally sure she’d be able to tell who it is through her tears. Were she not so distraught at the moment, she’d be a little surprised, because…well, he’s hurt, he’s been gone so long, and…even before, this wasn’t commonplace. Granted, she was never quite like she is right now, before, either. But she’s not really thinking about that, as she’s clinging onto him crying.
She shouldn’t be this broken.
He shouldn’t have to hold her together.
It’s not at all strange that he seems to know what to do, what she needs. He’s always understood things like that, and the ‘weird’ aspect faded out ages ago... She doesn’t speak, though she wants to thank him for this, for trying, even if it’s going to mess up his indifferent image and everything – for caring enough to bother with her in the first place, even with her being such a wreck like she is, both physically and mentally.
She finds it a little strange, Bobby’s verbal confirmation of what’s happened. Is it really so obvious? Can they tell? Is part of her physically missing..? No, that can’t be right, wouldn’t she have noticed something like that? Someone would have said something, too, right..?
Still, she’s not quite aware enough of those thoughts for them to distract her from her grief over her loss, but she can’t quite help but to feel embarrassed over it, simply because it wasn’t real, and they have to know that, and what do they think of her? Do they think she’s crazy?
She’s not going to bother adding the thought that maybe she is onto that. Just…no. First priority – stop crying. ...preferably sometime within the hour.
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Post by Pyro on Dec 13, 2006 22:04:50 GMT
He can’t blame Bobby for being caught up in his own problems but…
Fuck it. This *neutral* thing is never going to work out. Regardless of whether it’s justifiable or not he can, and will, think Bob’s an ass, because obviously this is about something other than his Cure shot (because it has to be that he’s referring to, the *they* being his powers, because the other option is that he’s being a callous git, and that’s stretching credibility just a little too far) It’s both terrifying and liberating that the rose-tinted specs seem to have fallen away, because somehow that brief functional phase is what fucked everything up, isn’t it?
… and that’s not a thought he should be having right now, not while he’s sort-of pissed off with Bob (and knows full well he’s more than pissed with him) and definitely not while he’s holding onto Rogue. Because if being broken is what works then he and Bob were doomed from the start, because Bob’s never been willing to admit that things can’t be fixed, and that’s not something he wants to have to contemplate… because he loves (loved?) Bob. He does (did?).
… back away from all that, because it’s an argument for another time (or, if he has his choice, one which never actually gets faced, because it leads to ugly places and uglier choices and… yeah. Not good. And maybe that makes him a coward, and maybe it means he’s in denial, but if it helps him survive then hell, he’s done worse. Much worse.). Back to the matter at hand, something he can control, at least, though he at least is resigned to the fact it can’t really ever be fixed (no, we’re not following that tangent, thanks. No way. Not now)
”Might be overstepping the mark here, Bob” – and shit, that sounds dangerously like the old him, doesn’t it? Not the almost-apology in the words, admittedly, but the tone and everything else is pitch-perfect – ”But somehow I doubt this is about your personal crisis… Just a wild guess n’all”
John shifts slightly in Rogue’s grip, re-angling himself against her protests so there’s just enough room for them to be almost face to face as opposed to her burying herself in him, tugging the end of his sleeve up over his hand so that it’s not a risk to brush her white streak back from, and then half-cup, her tear-streaked cheek. This too is something of the old him, the focused insistent come back here, Rogue, this isn’t you voice from the nightmare period only now it’s obviously not about displacing anyone else so much as centering her, almost the voice you’d use on a child except that there’s something harder to place hiding behind. ”That’s it, right? Something’s up with the psykes being gone?”
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Post by Rogue on Dec 14, 2006 2:15:57 GMT
At first, she can ignore that John’s talking, because…it’s not to her, right? Doesn’t sound like it, at least. She’s just …well, not content, but something like it, to stay like this, and just…cry. Let it out, and get rid of it, so she can get back to some semblance of normality.
But then he’s moving away, and that scares her. Really scares her, because…he left, before. She can’t have him leave now – there’s nothing left of him if he does, not like before... But he doesn’t move all the way away, and she maintains her hold on his shirt just as tightly, to ensure he can’t (not that he couldn’t, if he tried, but it still makes her feel better thinking that way), as he puts a covered hand on her face.
”That’s it, right? Something’s up with the psykes being gone?”[/color]
She can really only nod, at first. Once she speaks, though, it’s like everything’s just tumbling free, falling out too fast, and without any real semblance of order or sense, and she can’t really focus it enough to get a solid, normal explanation out.
“She killed ‘em... She got out, an’ she…I couldn’ stop ‘er... we couldn’ stop ‘er, an’ they’re gone, y’gone…it’s too quiet…”
The end breaks off in a choked sob, and she’s shaking even more, now. Obviously talking doesn’t really work, because getting it in the open just makes it more painful. More real..? It shouldn’t, should make her realize just how irrational it is for her to be this distraught, how much of an illusion she’s been living in…but it just brings into focus how real it all felt – still feels.
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Post by Bobby Drake on Dec 14, 2006 6:52:14 GMT
> " Might be overstepping the mark here, Bob, but somehow I doubt this is about your personal crisis… Just a wild guess n’all. "
It’s that, more than anything else, that makes it clear to Bob that his quixotic personal quest actually succeeded… that John’s actually back. Not the comment, but the way it’s delivered: the half-sneer in the voice, making him feel like he’s been stupid again, and the way John and Marie orbit around each other like they both know the rules to whatever game it is they’re playing.
He’d forgotten about this part.
> " That’s it, right? Something’s up with the psykes being gone? "
Oh, he thinks, realizing he kinda has been stupid again, and John was right; this hasn’t got anything to do with him at all. “They’re gone” – her “psykes.” John, Bob, Magneto – he wonders, idly, what they’re making of the last day’s events. But apparently they aren’t making anything of it, since apparently they’ve faded.
Which he’d thought would be a good thing, given how much grief they’d caused her. But apparently this is another thing he just doesn’t understand about Marie. Apparently she’d wanted them all along.
Fortunately (and it is fortunate, he tells reminds himself, really it is), he doesn’t have to understand, because apparently John does, and from the way she hold on to him apparently that’s enough.
And that’s good, because right this moment he lacks the energy to care. John’s back, and he and Marie can solve each other’s problems, and Bob can stay out of it without guilt, knowing he isn’t needed anymore, and it’s a relief, is what it is; that numb, empty feeling is (must be!) the way it feels to finally lay down a burden you’ve been lugging around forever. Knowing you can get back to worrying about your own life.
So he murmurs something appropriately sympathetic, not really listening too carefully, and in the peaceful solitude of his own mind he starts making plans for what happens next. He’s put his academic life on hold for almost a year; it’s time to pick it up again, if he can convince Ororo to let him. Which he’s pretty sure she will; she’s been pretty understanding so far. And maybe Mom and Dad won’t mind him coming home for Christmas now that he’s not really a mutant anymore. And…
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Post by Pyro on Dec 21, 2006 21:22:12 GMT
John tries asking her to ”Slow up, Roguey. No idea what you’re talking about” but it’s futile because she races on before finally choking and shivering… and there aren’t really many more words he can offer. Certainly none seem a more fitting response than just pulling her back into a proper hug, one arm round her waist holding her close, the other snaking up over her shoulders and almost shielding her head, fingers idly stroking her hair while she cries out, and he tries to figure out, whatever the hell happened while he was off handing her ex-boyfriend, the *love of his life*, over to the Magnetic Messiah and his brainwashed fraternity.
If it’s the normality which strikes him first - the weird way he seemed not to have changed at all – then it doesn’t take long for that to be swallowed up by the *something is very, very wrong* feeling. Not as far as Rogue goes, because that’s both obvious and in some weird way natural (because it makes sense that she’s find some way to out-do both him and Bob when they finally got around to evening up the personal crisis scoreboard… okay, chalk that up as a ‘not changed that much’ moment and forget it now... how the hell is thinking like that this natural?), but the fact that Bob doesn’t seem to register his first *normal* moment and the unusual stab (okay, mild poke, because it’s still a work-in-progress and there’s no way he’s ready – or, really, will ever be ready (or at least it seems that way now) – to turn anything like a stab at Bob) of venom in it… or the way that it’s Rogue he’s hugging and not him… or anything much, really.
And it’s immature and petty to let that get to him, sure. Even if he did have any sort of claim on Bob’s attention and affections now it would still be all sorts of pathetic and insecure, and now it’s… all of the above with a side order of ridiculous, stupid and delusional. He can’t quite decide which is more fucked up – wanting Bobby to be someone he’s not so he’d object to his trying to help Rogue, or having to face the fact that there’s nothing left that would prompt any such objection – and both of those are totally trumped by seeing Rogue’s breakdown and his casting in this weird role of having to hold her together as any sort of way to force Bob to start caring (seriously, trying to make him jealous? And using Rogue to achieve that? That’s a million sorts of screwed)… but that’s all arguments for later on, because right now they’re drowned out by the whiny little screech which hasn’t got the memo and can’t understand why Bob doesn’t care any more…
” ‘should probably take this somewhere more private. Just until she’s calmed down” Obviously it’s his nobler, more mature intentions and nothing so selfish and nasty, which prompts this next play in their definitely-not-a-game (because it’s not… no way he’d risk Rogue’s fragile hold on sanity to worm his way back into Bob’s bed), and obviously he doesn’t give a damn how Bob reacts because all his attention is on her now.
… that in mind, he doesn’t know why he tags on ”Her room, probably. I haven’t got things… Storm’s not sorted that out yet. So if you need anything… yep. Probably be there.”
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