xp_logs | Angelo and Nathan, Friday afternoon

Angelo brings Nathan the reports he wanted on their Southeast Asian mystery, and Nathan is Not Impressed to hear about one of the things that went on at the hotel in Seattle during the riot. The conversation turns to Amanda and her departure, but trails off in mutual inability-to-do-anything.

He'd had some sleep, now, so it was a rested and refreshed Angelo who made his way to Nathan's office with the information he'd wanted, before Seattle.

It was a slightly cranky Nathan who was waiting for him. As he'd told Angie, he had indeed wrenched his back, although he hadn't noticed yesterday, what with all the sleeping and the general soreness. "Come in," he growled at the knock on the door, not bothering to reach out to identify who it was.

Angelo put his head round the door with sudden hesitation when he heard the growl. "Brought the stuff you wanted."

"Stuff I... oh, the Southeast Asian stuff? Good." Nathan pushed the filing cabinet drawer shut and moved stiffly back over to his chair, sinking down into it with a wince. "That was fast. Expected you to be a few more days digging that up..."

Angelo shrugged. "Didn't have much else to do,"

"Add it to the 'read sometime before the end of the year' pile," Nathan said wearily, then shook his head as Angelo moved towards one of the towering mountains of files. "No, that's the 'to be investigated if we suddenly start having thirty-six hours in the day' pile. The one over there." He indicated it with a wave.

Angelo eyed the piles dubiously, adding his file to the right one. "We really need more help."

"I've asked Moira if she'll clone me. So far the answer is no." Nathan winced again, shifting in his chair. "Fuck, I feel like an old man today."

"What'd you do to yourself?"

"Didn't see me telling Angie? Wanda and I took a bit of a tumble - someone's plasma blast took out the fire escape we were standing on. And my back is a tad touchy, still. You'd think I'd broken it seven months ago or something." Nathan gave him a crooked smile.

Angelo winced. "Ow. What's Moira say about it?"

"She doesn't think I did any actual damage, but she wants me to take it easy for a while. Can't say that I mind." Nathan made a minute adjustment to the angle of the chair back, and sighed in relief. "There we go. So, speaking of Seattle... do you hate me for leaving you in charge?"

Angelo shrugged. "Somebody had to do it. Not like I could be much good in the riot."

"I'm glad you were there. Leaving Manuel in sole charge would not have been feasible."

Angelo pulled a face. "Yeah... not a good plan."

Nathan raised an eyebrow at the reaction. Not that Angelo and Manuel were each other's biggest fans in any case, and yet... "Did something happen?" he asked, a bit warily. "I know Manuel seemed off, at the airfield... but I was so exhausted at that point I could barely remember my own name."

"That'd probably be because he was hungover", Angelo said dryly. "Him an' Terry both."

Nathan's other eyebrow went up. "I beg your pardon?"

"It was kind of obvious, to anyone who wasn't dead on their feet. Those two wouldn't join the party in my room, an' I couldn't exactly force them. Guess they had their own party."

Nathan opened his mouth, then closed it again, briefly turning an interesting color. "I see."

"Yeah. So."

Nathan closed his eyes, counting to five. Slowly. Reminding himself that he hadn't had a lot of option as to what to do with the kids. "Son of a bitch. Do me a favor and keep that little tidbit to yourself for now?"

Angelo nodded. "Sure, can do. I probably would've done anyway."

"Mmm," was Nathan's rather dour comment. He was looking even more dissatisfied with the world than he had when Angelo had walked in, and that was saying quite a bit. "Shit. Here I was thinking that things at the hotel had gone off without a hitch."

"They almost did?" Angelo offered. "Everybody else was okay."

"I should have known better than to think Manuel could..." He bit his lip, then looked up at Angelo a bit grimly. "Do you know what Amanda did to him before she left? I'm not sure how much the gossip mill might have gotten ahold of at this point."

"Next to nothin', unless people deliberately aren't tellin' me 'cause of how me an' Amanda were."

"She broke their link."

".....ow."

"Succinct, but pretty much accurate," Nathan said tiredly. "I don't know how she did it, and hell, I was there with Jean trying to help him, right afterwards."

"I don't know much about telepathy, but I didn't think you could do that that way. Must've hurt her like hell too."

"Honestly?" Nathan stared at one of the few bare patches of his desktop for a long moment. "Whatever pain she's feeling right now, she deserves it. I know that sounds harsh," he said, before Angelo could respond, "but no one who's headblind can understand just how much worse a broken link is for a psi. I've been through it twice, Angelo, and I wouldn't wish it on my worse enemy." He hesitated for a moment. "Okay, maybe my uncle. But she could have had Charles undo the link at any point since she and Manuel started having trouble. Something would have had to have been done before she left, in any case. Doing it herself, and doing it like that... if he'd fought her, one or both of them could have wound up dead."

Angelo looked at him, eyes dark and troubled. "I don't know why she did it. Don't know why she did much of anythin' she did, this last month or so. 'cept savin' Remy, I get the why of that."

"We all got the why of it. It was the how that was the problem." Nathan shifted in his chair again, reflecting that yes, those were some nice back spasms building there. Lovely. At this rate he'd be crawling back upstairs. "I just wish I knew where she was," he murmured. "Part of me hopes she went to Pete. At least he'd make sure she was protected."

"Yeah. Not sure she would go to him, though. Not with how she talked about him after he left."

But where, then? The old woman in New Orleans? Margali? Nathan sighed, then winced again. "Damn it. Well, there's not a whole lot either of us can do right now, is there?" It struck him that he still hadn't told Dom. She was going to kill him.

"Guess not." It didn't mean he had to like it.

He was entirely too tired still to be brooding over this, because then he'd brood himself into a black pit he'd be the rest of the week climbing back out of, Nathan reflected bleakly. "All right," he said, hauling himself up out of the chair, something very close to a whimper escaping. "I need to... go upstairs. Hot water. Good work on getting those reports - start chasing down those Chinese figures, next?"

Angelo nodded. Distraction was good. "Will do."