xp_logs | Nathan, Cain and Rachel, Tuesday morning

After exchanging those brief and rather snarky emails with his father, Nathan decides to take Rachel out for some fresh air. They wind up at the boathouse, where Nathan and Cain talk about Saul, the sudden prevalence of weird viruses around the mansion, and the latest developments in Cain's search for Cameron Hodge. Also, Rachel charms a bird and convinces Cain that she's bent on world domination.

Rachel was projecting happy bubbly thoughts that seemed to be revolving around the sunlight and the cool fresh air and most especially the noises the birds were making, which she seemed to be doing her best to mimick. Nathan supposed he should be glad that she wasn't picking up on his mood. Meant his shields were back where they should be.

His telekinesis was, thankfully. The baby carrier floated beside him, at roughly waist-level, and Rachel seemed to be enjoying that as much or more than if he'd actually been carrying her. "Shall we go see Uncle Cain?" he asked, and got a delighted squeal in response. "I'll take that as a yes."

Glancing up from where he'd been splitting kindling out of the wood pile Wanda had left him, Cain twirled the axe in one hand. Nathan was walking up the path - not limping for once, that was a big accomplishment, Cain thought. But next to him...

"Shit," Cain breathed, throwing open the doors to the shed. Shoving the axe in a nearby cabinet, he closed it swiftly, spinning the combination lock quickly. Backing out, the doors to the shed were then slammed shut, barred, and locked.

Best to get anything sharp and dangerous away from the baby -especially since she was smiling and cooing. Cain wasn't fooled, not one bit.

Nathan saw Cain's rapid disposal of the axe and managed not to laugh -just. "I think Uncle Cain thinks you're a scary little girl who might be cherishing homicidal thoughts," he murmured to Rachel, who giggled, waving her hands. "He needs to hold that thought until you're two, doesn't he?"

"Ooo! Ooo!"

Nathan looked up with a rueful smile at Cain as they reached the boathouse. "Didn't mean to interrupt your woodchopping," he said.

Cain waved an arm dismissively, eyeing the baby critically. "No big thing. Good to see you're up and mobile."

Grunting, he scooped up an armload of kindling, dumping it in the wood bin beside the boathouse. "Gotta tell you, that old man of yours is one creepy son of a bitch."

Nathan did a double-take before he could help himself. "You... uh, yeah," he finally said, a bit disbelievingly. "Actually, I was out for some fresh air because I got a couple of emails from him this morning and needed to depressurize a little."

"...heeheehee..." came from the baby carrier.

Nathan frowned, studying Cain. "You didn't meet him when he was here... oh." Realization hit. "Moira told me he was at the hospital when they brought me in."

Cain nodded, leaning against the house. "She almost tore him a new one, from what I understand. Summers buzzed me up to get him out of there before Moira was liable to put him through a wall. Bit of a hellion, that wife of yours." He rubbed his jaw with a chuckle and a knowing grin. "Your old man behaved himself, though. Was half tempted to see if I could throw him all the way back to wherever it is he's from - but he just took the elevator down and got in a taxi, no trouble at all. Creepy, though."

Nathan grimaced and then glanced at the baby carrier. It floated up to a gentle landing on the stairs, Rachel squeaking happily all the while. "He wanted to know how I was," he muttered. "In the email, I mean. I don't know why I even answered. Doesn't bode well for my new resolution not to do anything stupid when one of them takes a poke at me, does it?"

"You've just about used up all your stupid credit," Cain agreed, peering over at Rachel in her carrier. "But I ain't gonna try and figure him out. If y'ask me, which you probably shouldn't, I'd have someone else answering all that stuff, way you did with MacInnis. Hell, that bastard seems to have been more of a father to you than your own blood. But then again, I ain't the one you oughta be asking."

"I could always lock them in a room together and see what happens," Nathan muttered, part of him rather liking the idea. "Personally I'd bet on Mac, baseline human or not." A sparrow landed on the side of the baby carrier, peering down at Rachel, who squealed, and Nathan raised an eyebrow. "Okay, that's creepy," he said, starting over to the steps. "Shoo," he said, waving at the bird.

Cain pointed. "You see that?" he said abruptly. "She's starting. First it's a bird, then it's an army." He peered cautiously into the carrier. "I know you understand me," he growled, "I'm watching you."

Sucking on her fist, Rachel gave him an adorable look that had 'Who, me?' written all over it. Nathan laughed and picked up the carrier with the good arm, wincing a little as the burns pulled. "She gets her megalomaniacal tendencies from her mother," he said, climbing the steps. Maybe if he set her down in one of the chairs where she could watch the water, she'd stop trying to tempt birds within TK-grabbing range. "And she has a definite thing about birds. You ought to see her and Bella."

"Just keep her away from Hitchcock films and it'll be fine," Cain said dryly, regarding the baby with no small amount of suspicion. "Y'got a lot more patience than I do for raising the little monster."

"You tell Uncle Cain you're not a little monster," Nathan said to Rachel. "Even if you did try and impale Jean with flying pieces of needles yesterday." He shot an amused look back at Cain. "You saw my post? Literally, she blew up the damned syringes as soon as she saw Jean moving towards her with them. Good thing my TK's back to what it should be." He looked down at Rachel more seriously. "I was worried," he said. "After we found out that whatever Betsy had affected psis..."

Cain frowned. As doubtful as he was about the supposed angelic purity of Rachel Kinross, the last thing he wanted to see was the kid hurt, especially from something spilling over from one of the team's missions. "She's okay, yeah?"

"Yeah. All of the rest of us tested clean for it, actually," Nathan said, adjusting the blanket covering Rachel. "Must have taken closer contact than any of us had with Betsy in the last few days to pass it along. We dodged a bit of a bullet, I think."

"Except Betsy," Cain corrected, a look of concern on his face. "Ain't heard much from the docs other than just passing it off, but... every time you get your brain folded, spindled, and mutilated, you spend a week or two stark raving mad or blind or whatnot. Just seems weird, is all."

Nathan looked up, hearing the concern in Cain's voice. "She's going to be fine," he said firmly. "What Hank came up with is a cure, not just a treatment." He snorted softly. "For a bioweapon, it doesn't sound to have been a very sturdy little bug. I'm jealous."

Confused, Cain cocked his head until he realized what Nate was getting at. "Yeah, that bug you got. Your lungs, right? How come they can't fix that?"

Nathan shrugged. "Its designers were better than the ones who came up with whatever Betsy got, I guess. Moira's tried all kinds of things over the years. Sometimes the treatments knock it back a little, but then the damned thing just mutates and comes back stronger."

"Huh," Cain mused, giving a quick glare to Rachel as he walked by her to sit on a stump. "It ain't something, I mean..." he jerked his head at the baby. "If it's something that might affect her? Moira's the best doctor I've ever met, so she's probably already thought of all that, but still - you think there's anything that can be done?"

"I was worried about that, too," Nathan murmured. Rachel blinked up at him. "But Moira and Hank were running tests all through her pregnancy and after the munchkin arrived, and there's no sign of it in her system. And you have very healthy lungs, don't you?" he asked Rachel wryly. She giggled, still sucking on her fist. "Every time I hear you shriek for half a minute on a single breath I keep toying with the idea of calling Guiness."

Rolling his eyes, Cain tried not to chuckle. "Bugs in people's lungs, bugs in people's brains, wacky albino Russians sweating out bugs -it's a damn good thing I can't get sick. You people are like a plague waiting to happen."

"Yeah, I'm beginning to detect a definite theme to September, too," Nathan conceded, sitting down in the chair beside the one where he'd set the baby carrier. Rachel waved her free hand at him, and he offered her a finger to grab. "I'm off training until the beginning of October," he said abruptly, sounding rather chagrined. "The burns are healing up pretty well but the arm and the ribs are going to take a little while longer."

"You're off, I'm back on," Cain joked, "Hey - I've got something you may want to work on, gotta bounce it off Summers first." He tapped his chin thoughtfully. "You and Espinosa are tracking info on nonprofits and whatnot dealing with mutant stuff? I'm gonna be coming into some info soon that I might need you to look into. May be something, may be nothing. But I got a bad hunch it's something. And given that it's my money that's concerned, I got a bit of an interest."

"Oh?" Nathan said, looking intrigued. He knew the basics of what had happened with Cameron Hodge, of course. "New developments? But yeah, of course - if it's got any connection to the sort of thing Angelo and I are doing you've got my full attention."

Cain sat down and calmly related the tale of how he'd given his accountant, Cameron Hodge, power of attorney over his finances during his seemingly permanent invalid status last winter. Hodge, however, had taken the opportunity to abscond with nearly all of Cain's sizable trust fund, leaving the big man with thoughts of vengeance.

"So I had Remy doing some inquiries," Cain announced in closing, "And it seems that he can confirm that Cameron had a meeting four months ago with some political folks on Capitol Hill who also happen to have ties to that little Friends of Humanity group. Might be something, might be nothing."

Nathan frowned thoughtfully. "The FoH is on my watch list, obviously. They funnel funds to other anti-mutant activist groups, that much is blatantly obvious with a little digging." Rachel got a death-grip on his finger, and he tugged back absently, provoking another squeal. "I've been trying to create a basic profile on their various ties to other groups... a lot of them do have to report their earnings, so if there's any sudden bump in their available funds it would show up."

"You do that," Cain said quietly. "And keep me apprised. Because, you know, there's the big picture. But then there's personal."

"The two aren't always easily separated, anyway," Nathan said, thinking about some of his personal motivations for trying to understand the big picture. "Still, if I find anything that might lead back to Hodge, you'll be the first to know."

Cain leaned back, hands laced behind his head. "Appreciate it. Now, you and the spawn of Satan want a beer?"