LOG: Haroun and Alison - Meeting for Lunch

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Haroun and Alison meet for lunch, as they are wont to do in their busy schedules. She gets an interesting package in the mail. Lots of romance fluff.



Haroun walked up to the suite after having grabbed the pile of mail with their names on it from the mail room. Mostly crap, it looked like, but Alison got a thick FedEx envelope from some ... engineering firm? Intrigued, he stifled his urge to open her mail for her and instead put it into the ALISON mail basket kept by the door. He'd mention it to her when she arrived to have lunch. With her being so busy and him in physio so often, they didn't get a chance to share many moments together anymore.

"Hey!" The call came from the door a while later, a few minutes before noon, Alison walking in the common room of their suite with an exagerated sigh. "I made it early today! Ha!" She sounded pleased with herself to say the least and she offered Haroun a bright smile as she spotted him, hands planted on his hips, the very picture of one who had conquered her schedule for the day. "And how was your morning?"

"You did." he said with a sappy smile. It was good to see her smile, to see her bright and cheery moods. "Mail call." he pointed out. "Some big package from an engineering firm. And the morning's going fairly well. Good mobility day, back doesn't hurt much, and I made progress in physio. Life so far is good." he grinned.

"An engineering firm?" Alison frowned a bit at that, eyes shifting to stop upon the package itself, before focusing on Haroun once more. The important stuff first, without a doubt. She walked lazily towards him, arms outstretched, grinning at the news he had to share. "Well, sounds like you had a very good morning indeed!"

Haroun grinned, and then tried something both very romantic and ultimately very foolish. He swept up Alison and dipsmooched her. Unfortunately for him, at the nadir of the dip, during the all-important smooching part, his back screamed at him that this was Really Dumb, Thank You. Still, he did as thorough of a job of it as he could before slowly straightening up and trying to stifle a wince.

The wince was still visible for someone who knew what to look for and Haroun's back had been near audible in its protests. Alison took a shallow breath (because my had she missed those kinds of greetings) and patted his cheek lightly. "You look like you're due for a good backrub. Why don't you get settled and after that, we can do lunch?"

Haroun whimpered in sheer joy at the prospect. "Sounds fine." he said, trying to play it cool and failing miserably. He flopped himself belly-down on the ground and waited for Alison to work her magic. "So, you going to open up your envelope?" he asked.

She laughed at his antics, shaking her head. "Lemme get a floor mat at least," she snickered, suiting deed to words and fetching one of the rolled up mats she used for meditating from the closet. "There, shift to this. Careful now..."

Haroun flopped his way onto the mat and then stretched himself out as best he could, with fairly minimal success. "You have _no idea_ how good this is going to feel." he said with a whimper. "I think I like this one. Can I keep her?" he asked no-one in particular as she went to work.

The massage cream was retrieved as well and Alison poured a dollop in her hands, letting it warm for a moment. Straddling his thighs while making sure not to let too much weight come to bear, Alison leaned forward, pressing both hands flatly against the base of his back for a moment, simple pressure and nothing more. "Hrm, we think you, yes," she grinned, before starting to work on muscle groups she'd had to relearn not too long ago, which took on slightly different - and sometimes very different - paths than before.

Haroun was not shy about expressing what worked and what didn't as she worked the steel-cable-muscles into a semblance of relaxed. "So -going to open your envelope now?" he asked her with a grin as he enjoyed the reduction in the tension in his back. "Inquiring minds and all that."

With a vague feeling the tension might return soon, Alison smiled softly and nodded, leaning off to the side so he could turn around and see the repeat of the gesture. "Sure. It concerns you in a way, anyway..." She stretched out one arm to tug the envelope off the table and it dropped into her hands with a heavy thump, the flexibility of it enough to show that the contents were likely paper. Lots of paper. She started to open it, curious herself as to the contents - it was the first time she'd received something this hefty since taking over the company...

Haroun managed to get his curiosity into an arm-bar, but the curiosity refused to tap out. "So what's going on?" he asked, still lying on his stomach with her lightly straddling his hips. Now was NOT the time for his brain to go perv-shaped, he reminded it pointlessly. "Anything I need to know about?"

"Yeah," she nodded again, slowly, and moved to rest on the floor beside him as well, leaning on her elbows as she finished pulling out the sheaf of papers. "You know how the new 'ware you've got was substantially modified and all?"

Haroun pouted for a second. She MOVED! Unfair! But then he forgot about being childishly immature in favor of the stuff she was spreading onto the floor. "You had mentioned." he said neutrally. "The Brat Pack did a significant reworking of the original design, I thought."

"They did. Only, you know, there was that pesky thing called patents and Shaw being an ass… Emma Frost gave us permission to modify the software as much as we wanted, but with Shaw not even wanting to turn over the replacement 'ware we'd needed in the first place… weeeeeell… we had to get a little bit creative." She read over the cover letter carefully, noting that the president of the company seemed earnest to keep the staff as was, despite… the profit loss issue? "Huh. Anyway. This company was part of that being creative bit."

Haroun thought that over for a second. "Let me see if I have this straight. Emma gave you the software and her blessing. Shaw wouldn't give you hardware, so ... you bought the company?" he asked in a small voice.

"Erm. Not exactly." Alison stared down at the letter before her studiously. "I… sorta dragged Cain along and we raided Shaw's office for all the Jetstream info, I printed myself an invoice of what we needed and then we got all the hardware kinda sorta legit?" Alison looked up, offering Haroun a tentative smile. "And Cain buttonholed Shaw so there's no follow-up there. And… then I bought the company. After we figured out that it was the one with the patents on the hardware we modified?"

"Wow." he said, still trying to absorb the enormity of what she'd done. "Guess getting spare parts won't be a problem..." he said, still kind-of stunned by her revelation. "Why?" he asked finally. "Why do it?"

She assumed he didn't mean launching an all out attack on Shaw's office and didn't mind (at all) just glossing over that little detail. It still left a lot to cover. "You…" she shook her head and set the paper down, shifting closer and nestling against his side. "You great big stupidhead. What, I was supposed to just hope Shaw wouldn't try and claim the rights to the hardware inside of you at any given time? Stuff that you need to live? That just wasn't happening! It wasn't," she repeated fiercely, under her breath. "So… I liquidated a lot of assets and set my accountants and business people loose and they managed to get the company without Shaw ever knowing I was the one making the offer. Heck, I don't think he even knows it was sold. It seems to be a pretty minor branch, different name and not associated to Shaw Industries at all. We're still trying to figure out why all the patents which were crucial to your hardware were tied into that place…"

Haroun exhaled deeply. "That's a lot to live up to." he finally said. "And incredibly dangerous!"

Reaching out, Alison touched his cheek gently, fingertips lingering in a caress. "I'm just glad you're alive… anything else - was worth it." She leaned over to press her cheek against his, closing her eyes for a moment, letting her breath escape her slowly. "I'm just happy you're okay."

"For some values of OK, yeah." he said. "Not anywhere near 100%, but considering the alternative, I'll take it. I just wish ... wish you hadn't had to do that. To make yourself a target." he said worriedly. "I can't protect you."

She sighed and shook her head at him gently, shifting to her side to look at him, leaning her chin on her hand and her elbow on the floor while resting her other hand on his shoulder. "I think we both know I'm a target anyway for other stuff." She looked down at her shoulder, the edges of blackened, ugly scars peeking through slightly. "We both are. Might be anything, anytime." It felt a bit odd, to be the one saying such a thing, as it was usually Haroun's line in conversations such as this. "And I won't accept any compromise when it comes to protecting the ones I love."

Haroun blinked at that, and had to bite down his first reaction, which was to snuggle up and break down bawling. He was such a marshmallow. "Thought I was supposed to protect you, not the other way around." He said with a slight sniffle. "You've already been through Hell."

She shivered a bit at his choice of words, but smiled at him crookedly nonetheless - his expression was getting to her and teary eyed was getting to be a state she'd hit soon, at this rate. "Tell you what… how about we trade protecting duties now and then and make it an even thing?" She leaned down, kissing his ear lightly before resting her head on his shoulder. "I think we've already been pretty good at doing that anyway, right?"

Haroun told his male pride to go sod off, but it wasn't listening. "I'll work on it." he said. He then rolled over to look up at her. Then he kissed her. Hard.

"Mrf!" Eyes widening a bit at this, Alison didn't protest in the least - it was the first time he was taking this sort of initiative since the Maverick mission and its aftermath and any other coherent thought was fast heading into oblivion at the sudden - and very welcome - attention. And not even the hardwood floor was about to register, the motion having taken them well off the mat on the floor nearby.