Alison and Scott, Friday afternoon

[x-cyclops.livejournal.com]

Alison stops by to see Scott. He broaches the subject of her trying her hand at back-up duty for the weekend. She is receptive. More than receptive. Enthusiastic is not the word.


Moving around was noticeably easier today. He wouldn't want to be fighting, or running, or hell, climbing stairs, but moving around the suite was a tolerable, if slow process. Currently, Scott was sprawled rather carefully on the couch, reading one of the latest books Shan had given him. Even that, he was doing a little more slowly than usual. He had taken a painkiller an hour or so ago, and his head was a bit foggy. Pleasantly so, though, which was kind of odd.

A quick knock and answering call, and Alison was peering through the opened door at him, leaning in a bit further to continue her inspection for a while longer before speaking. "Heeeeya. Hrm. You and Haroun, I swear. Brothers McBruises, the two of you..."

Scott couldn't help a smile. "Yeah, yeah," he said, and didn't get up. He was semi-upright thanks to the pillows Jean had so carefully arranged for him, and this was Alison; she didn't need him leaping to his feet to greet her. Even if leaping was feasible at the moment. "Well, the other brother McBruise could have gotten there five minutes earlier and stopped me from getting pulled through a wall, but I forgive him..."

"Yeah, I keep hearing stuff about being put through walls and planting oneself through walls and bouncing off walls..." Lips quirking a bit, the sting of not having been there still ever present but nicely under control, Alison made a face at him. "Looks ilke you're getting a break for a bit now." A pause. "Pun so very unintended." Alison groaned faintly as she stepped inside, slapping her forehead lightly.

Scott raised his bandage-swathed hand and cocked an eyebrow. "Not a bad pun, though. And I still think Nate's got us all beat with the coatrack." Scott couldn't help a shudder. No taking trainees on missions for a while, he reflected, even if Bobby and Shiro had done better than fine in this latest semi-fiasco. "Want to sit down?" he offered lightly. "I may be taking up the couch but we're not short on chairs..."

"Oh, I'm going to sprawl on the floor. Being able to stretch out limbs is good." She was pushing it both in the gym and in sparring - but only just, trusting Haroun to pull her back if she went too far, while she focused only on pushing forward. "You'll be off duty for a bit with that hand, won't you?"

Scott opened his mouth and then closed it again, regarding her a little suspiciously over the edge of his book. "Off anything active," he temporized, wishing, not for the first time, for a little telepathy. Alison was harder to read than most people, and he wished he knew precisely what... oh, to hell with it. "And I... uh, was considering taking a few more days officially off, too. Into the beginning of next week."

"Huh. That'd leave Ororo alone with no back up." The statement was made diffidently enough, though Alison was looking straight at him with one of those expressions of eternal patience. "Of course, you taking time off is nothing short of a minor mirable and to be encouraged at all costs." She continued, with the same dead serious expression. "Also saves us the postage on stuffing you inna crate to Italy or something."

Scott made a face at her, then sighed. "Okay, fine. I talked to Charles, and he told me that he thought... asking you to serve as backup to Ororo for a few days would not be out of line. As a way of testing the waters, so to speak. If you feel ready." Scott went on before she could answer. "And if you don't, Alison, you can just say so and we can forget I asked the question. I'm probably just being a wimp anyway." He pushed himself upright, trying not to bite his lip too obviously as he put a little too much strain on the shoulder and his ribs chimed in with how displeased they were at the sudden movement, too.

"If I poke you in that shoulder, you will cry like a little girl." That said, Alison did her best not to leap over to the couch to beat him over the head with a chair to make sure he stayed out for longer than a few days. "I would like to serve as back-up for Ororo for a few days, yes. In fact, I really really want to. In a 'I will go stir crazy and start blowing up things' if I don't get to do something real soon sort of way." Finally she grinned, breaking some of the tension. "Pwetty pwease?"

Scott stared at her and then sighed, rolling his eyes. "I should learn not to think, you know. Because thinking about these things inevitably leads to me getting them wrong. I should just smile, nod, and trust Charles." But he regarded her for a long moment with a faint smile that somehow managed to combine wry amusement and wistfulness and a certain amount of anxiety, too. "I just didn't want to push," he said, then took a judicious deep breath and let it out again. "But I'm getting really tired, Al. These last few missions, plus the damned plane getting broken twice... I don't want to start making mistakes. And if I let myself keep going right now I might get to the point where I do." And, as went without saying, he was as utterly terrified of that prospect as he had been a year ago.

"Thinking's fine! So long as it's 'let Alison do something before she goes nuts' thinking!" Lips quirking, giddy with the notion of finally being able to get back to things, even if as a trial period before a final evaluation, Alison tried not to bounce in place like a hyperactive child on too much sugar. "Take a break. Even if it's just a few days, it should help. And you'll be back-up for a while anyway after because of that hand - when I get cleared and it shouldn't be too long now," horay for positiive thinking! " then Ororo and I can alternate being on duty with you as backup and with your week off and all. We should be able to handle that fine, all of us." She was including Scott in that, obviously.

"That's a good point," Scott said slowly. He wouldn't really be shirking things, doing it this way. It would give Alison a chance to get back into the saddle a little and see how it felt, without putting too much pressure on him, and would allow him to depressurize a bit. "Three is good," he said, mustering a slightly less conflicted-looking smile. "That's the whole point of having three, right? Mutual support and all..."

"Good. Then... since you already talked about it with Charles and I figure Ororo knows too... this mean the weekend's mine and Haroun's for back up duty, all official like?" She gave up on trying not to look over-eager and instead just grinned for all she was worth.

"So long as he's okay for that," Scott said with a more natural smile. "I know he got fairly banged up, too. Although he's more of a masochist than I am, so he may not let that stop him..."

"Well, it's back-up duty. And I'll try and keep him from hitting anything with his head, considering the new dental work and all." Haroun would be perfectly happy about it, she knew - it wasn't as though he would ever complain about being on duty or of overwork or even consider anything as such. "I figure, after I've logged a decent number of hours to make up for keeping you and Ororo so busy lately, I'll just kidnap him and take him on a trip. Vacation overseas or something."

"You don't need to make up for anything," Scott said more softly. "You know that, right?" He gave a sigh that would have been a laugh if there'd been any real force behind it. "It's... going to be really good to see you back, Al. And I'm not just saying that because I'm feeling bruised and vaguely whiney."

"Figure of speech. It's more the fact that I want and need to get back into the swing of things, really." And she did, there was no doubt about it - both in terms of reclaiming what was hers and refusing to give even the ghost of an inch to what had happened to her. In fact, she intended to be the one to regain ground, at one point. But - not just yet. Only when she was sure she had control.

Scott was more than reassured by the calm he could see and hear behind the excitement. No nervousness that he could pick up on, although he imagined that some was there. But if there was more determination... well, boded well. And he really should have trusted Charles instead of worrying about it.

"You know," he started, a teasing edge to his voice, "I even have a whole list of things that you-as-backup could be doing this weekend... stuff I should have done these last few days."

"Gimme!" Alison grinned at that, a small voice laughing gleefully in the back of her mind at the thought. Sure, she'd talked to Forge about being an auxiliairy, but she wasn't sure that was team leader stuff per say so much as just plain common sense and giving Forge the change to push his power further, really. "Haroun's been good about letting me train and spar myself senseless, but hey, work to balance that out can only be good, right?"

"It's, um, in the database," Scott said, flushing a little. "'catchingup0817.doc', in the CO's section. And that's me who'd have been doing the catching up," he rushed to assure her. "Not you."

Alison grinned, a bit too widely so. "Scott? If I've been away for weeks now and my getting back to work isn't catching up or making up, then you can't say that you missing a few days and getting back log is catching up either." She looked at his hand. "Mr The Bones In My Hand Went Crunch."

Scott winced. "Oh, don't remind me," he said feebly. "Please? I am never doing the optic blast-punch-optic blast combination again. However well it works on most people."

"Well, hey. I'm never trying for suspended flight again later." And no, Alison decided, she wasn't about to go further into detail on that one, either. "And now, I think I will scurry off to hoard the work you've just put a bit treasure map X on for me and I'll let you rest a bit before someone wanders over and throws things at me for keeping you from napping. Sounds fair?"

She was so delighted about it. It was impossible not to think that this had been precisely the right thing to do after all. Scott could almost feel his mood improving. "Yes, you do that," he said mock-severely. "Seeing as though I'm old and decrepit and need my nap..."

"Oooh. I think I still have my cane from last year. I can bring that over after if you need it to get around!" Alison beamed at him, all the while getting ready to duck whatever he might decide to throw at her for the pure display of cheek.

"You're lucky my throwing arm isn't working properly." Scott laughed and picked his book back up. "You can let yourself out. I have no manners."

Snickering, Alison rose to her feet and backed away from the door, not commenting at all on the fact that a year ago, Scott would have likely been far more critical of the fact that he couldn't throw easily from both arms. Though, she reflected as she waved at him before heading out back towards her room (and new work loot!) she woudn't be horribly surprised if he decided to do something about it, sooner or later.