xp_logs | Nathan and Moira, Thursday afternoon

Moira tracks down her brooding husband and they talk things out after the name-flinging and snarling via email.

It had been forever since he'd been up on the flyer's platform. Well, not literally, Nathan thought as he stared out over the grounds, one leg bent under him and the burned one stretched out as comfortably as he could get it. There just hadn't been a whole lot of need or opportunity for brooding lately. Which was a good thing, of course. But he'd forgotten how good the view was.

Leaning against the doorway to the platform, Moira took in a couple of breaths of fresh air. She'd been downstairs for far too long and though she was still incredibly irritated with Nathan, she was enjoying the fact that he was brooding outside today. Not saying anything, she waited, knowing he knew she was there.

"If you've come to read me the riot act," he finally said, "I'm going to cover my ears with my hands and start chanting 'lalala'. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb since you all think I'm being a child anyway." It didn't come as petulant-sounding as he'd half-expected it. More desperately humorous than anything else.

"Ye are bein' awfully stubborn about this," she responded, sliding down the door jamb to sit comfortablly. "An', aye, I think ye were bein' childish. Do ye nay think tha' we dinnae know all yer normal "weird signs" by now? Wha' Clarice said is nay somethin' tha' happens normally, Nathan."

"I know. I talked to her. Well, exchanged emails. I didn't..." He stopped, troubled, then went on. "I didn't remember anything more than zoning out."

"An' tha' doesnae strike ye as odd? Wha' if..." Moira tilted her head around the corner but still, she didn't want to take chances. "Yer 'accident' caused more problems than we initally saw?"

Nathan swallowed. "Been thinking about that," he said a bit hoarsely. "Epilepsy is something wrong with the electrical activity in your brain, right? And the balance of psionic energy in my body got all fucked up." He paused, then shook his head. "On the other hand," he went on tiredly, "if more's happening than I remember when I zone out... I think I might have been doing it before my 'accident'. There was this time in the library with Kitty, and a few others... but I just figured it was me zoning out."

"So, are ye jus' tired o' th' jokes 'bout bein' in MedLab? Is tha' why ye never went in? I mean, 'onestly, Nathan." Pushing herself up, she walked over to look down at him. "Wha' if I 'ad been 'avin' those symptoms an' refused ta go? Wha' would ye do?"

"Thrown you over my shoulder and carried you down," Nathan said almost inaudibly, not looking up at her. "And yeah, I am tired of the jokes about being in the medlab. I'm tired of being in the medlab. I still feel, not surprisingly, like one of my best friends beat the shit out of me a couple of weeks ago, and I'm tired of having to keep up the appearances and pretend that I'm bouncing right back from having walked out into traffic like an idiot. Which I am, just a different kind of idiot. And the idea that I've developing... bloody epilepsy or some such thing is scaring the hell out of me."

Curling her legs under her, she sat next to him. When he was like this, it was better that he come to her instead of the other way around. "Did ye know tha' when Angie uses her precognition, her mind is essentially undone? Her mental state breaks down, 'tis rather frightenin' ta watch, really."

Nathan shuddered briefly. Just the breeze. "Got caught up in it on the telepathic level the once, remember?

"In verra simplistic terms we could give 'er medication but it would, effectivaly turn her power off." She shook her head and brushed the bangs from her face. "Nathan, while this sounds like epilepsy, keep in mind tha' there's a good chance tha' tis nay tha'." She smiled, a little bit. "Avoidin' th' MedLab because ye dinnae want ta know th' answer isnae goin' ta solve anythin' but gettin' us all incredibly angry at ye. If tha' was th' case, I'd never want ta be tested for cancer, ever."

"I didn't." He didn't want to think about that last bit. Ever. At all. "If I'd thought it was more than just blanking out from time to time... but first Clarice is telling me that something happened that I don't remember, and then before I had any time to think about it, you showed up and dragged me down to medlab by my ear growling at me all the way. And then Maddie acted like I was... contagious or something, and wanted me away from her as quickly as possible, and don't you tell me that was all about being annoyed with me, because I know damned well it wasn't."

He only tended to not breathe during a sentence when he was really upset. "We're all incredibly stressed. Between Tommy, Haroun an' the sudden rash o' patients from whatever happened wit' Betsy..." Moira frowned. "We're stretchin' ourselves so thin right now. But tha's a reason ta be SEEIN' us, honey, nay ignorin' th' MedLab. We worry less when we've got tests ta run, we worry more when our patients run away from us."

Nathan stared down at his hands. "I've had a headache since the business with Betsy," he said quietly. "Stopped in to see Charles, and he told me to take it easy in the telepathic sense for a few days. What I was saying earlier, about the balance of energies getting screwed up..." He waved a hand in a tight, frustrated gesture, his jaw clenching. "I've been trying so hard not to be a hassle. I know how hard you're all pushing. But you're all talking like I willfully and knowingly ignored the fact that I was having... whatever the hell these episodes are. I didn't know. And I had all of an hour or two after Arabic class before you came storming in. That doesn't constitute ignoring the problem!" The frustration and underlying fear was starting to bubble up inside him, as desperately as he was trying to keep it well under wraps and off both links. "I'm not a child. I'm not an invalid. I am not... Calamity Nate, or whatever the hell the kids are calling me in their heads this week! I am not in the hospital every second day, and I do not need a damned plastic bubble!" He stopped, sucking in a deep, shaky, rasping breath. "And now I'm ranting. I'm sorry."

"Ye obviously needed ta get it off yer chest," Moira said softly, staring up into the sky. "I'm sorry if ye think we're crowdin'. But Nathan, I could 'ave lost ye th' other week." So maybe her voice skipped, just a bit. "An' the thought tha' somethin' was happenin' right on th' tail end o' tha' was a little ta much ta take. Some o' th' reasons for ye endin' up in th' MedLab were out o' yer 'ands. Others...we bot' know tha' thin's could 'ave been handled different on a number o' occassions. But ye've got a chance now ta learn from those lessons, thankfully."

He reached out and took her hand, but kept staring out bleakly at the grounds. "December, I wound up in the medlab after I helped save Cain's life," he said, his voice very low again. "I slept a night in the Box in January, and that was Hank's idea, to give me a break from everyone thinking about the Columbia. I spent a night in the medlab after the Canada mission in February because I overstrained my powers fighting Tim. Then Youra. Then the precognitive unfortunateness with the chocolate cake just before the wedding. Then my 'accident'." Nathan's jaw clenched. "Ten months, five incidents. And the only ones I really had any control over were the chocolate cake and what happened with Pete. If I had it to do over again, I'd probably skip taste-testing the cake, but if I could do that other Sunday afternoon over again? I'd do it again. I'd be smarter about it, get back-up somehow, but I am never going to forget the faces of those kids from Chad, Moira. And I'd never have been able to live with myself if I hadn't tried."

His shoulders sagged, and he squeezed her hand. "And you wonder why the flippant crap about the plastic bubbles and people acting like I wind up in the hospital every week bugs the shit out of me. It's like suddenly, all the stuff I've done right this year, all the stuff I did right this summer and came back with no worse than bruises from doesn't matter."

Threading her fingers through his, she sighed. "They tend to run together...especially on me nerves," she admitted, dryly. "Former Mistra, former Pack, now an X-Man, so I expect ye ta get battered an' bruised. I should be used ta it by now, ye did come ta Muir more bloodied an' beatened than whole for a while there. Maybe now tha' I'm actually seein' ye get 'urt an' nay jus' a few days, or weeks, later tha' it makes it so much worse."

She snorted and let him draw her closer. "Feels like we baby ye?"

He surprised himself with a smile. It was a weak, tentative little smile, not lasting for more than a few seconds, but it was there. "I don't actually like getting battered and bruised. Especially since you don't find it attractive. Our textbook case of Florence Nightingale syndrome notwithstanding..."

Snicking slightly, Moira grinned at him. "I think I can give Nightingale a run for 'er money, yeah?" Reaching over with her free hand, she pushed some stray hair off his forehead. "'Tis nay tha' I dinnae worry as much back then as I do know, 'tis tha' ye see it more often an' I dinnae 'ave month's between visits ta worry meself sick durin'."

"Never thought of it that way." Maybe he should have. But then, it wasn't Moira's worry that so often had him wanting to chew through things just to express his frustration, and he pushed that across the link at her tentatively. "I wish..." He trailed off, then shook his head, another tight, miserable gesture. "Maddie was making me really uncomfortable last night. The way she was behaving, like she couldn't wait to get me away from her. I don't know what I did to deserve that, Moira, but it didn't help."

"Talk ta 'er about it? Avoidin' th' issue willnae get ye anywhere. I'm nay sure wha' was goin' on, except tha' she's really at th' end o' her rope." Raising his hand, she kissed the back of it. "We all need a vacation."

"I'd kill to go home for a few days, you know," Nathan sighed. "Billie and Anna are going to fly over here at some point soon to see her, you realize, if we don't get over there within a reasonable timeframe." He forced another wan smile. "Maybe next month, huh?"

"An' Curt...oh dear God, I need ta call 'im. I probably took ten years off o' his life wit' tha' pop in wit' Clarice." She couldn't help but giggle a little. Curt was probably the best person she could ever have at her side over there. And he and his wife were truely adorable. "Next month or whenever th' insanity cools down, aye. Home would be lovely."

His pocket started to squeak, and Nathan blinked, then used his free hand to pull out the baby monitor. "She's giggling again," he said as they listened for a moment or two. "Is it just me or is that not profoundly disturbing? No wonder Cain thinks she's plotting things."

"Think we should go down an' make sure she's nay takin' over th' world yet?"

"I told her," Nathan said, hauling himself wearily to his feet. "She's not allowed to take over the world until she's toilet-trained. She laughed." He winced, all the burns pulling as he moved. "I think I'm cutting too far back on the painkillers this week."

"Dork. When we get down, let me take a look at wha' ye cut it down ta an' I'll up it a bit, aye?" Moira looked at him blankly. "Love, if our darlin' daughter decided ta take over th' world, I'm so blamin' ye."

"Oh, pfeh. She gets all the organizational and strategic genius from you, so don't be pointing fingers at me..."