xp_logs | The Trans-Siberian Hustle: Occam's Razor Need Not Apply (2/4)

After the COs finish their conference, Nathan stops in the Situation Room to give Alison some of the information she wanted. He looks over the careful plan for a straight-out rescue mission and muses about how nice it would be if they could screw Gideon a little more completely than simply blowing this deal for him. Alison starts to see the possibilities.

"So is all the heavy strategizing done, then?" Nathan asked Alison, poking his head through the door of the Situation Room. Which was open, which was the only reason he was being this nosey. Well, that and he'd finished the obvious make-work Alison had given him to keep him out from underfoot. "I have those train schedules, by the way," he said, waving the print-outs. "And I think we can land the 'Bird at an abandoned airstrip just outside the city."

"Yes," she drawled out the word slowly, still peering intently at the computer screen of the station she'd selected for a last minute review, but she raised one hand overhead, waving him in slowly. "Landing just outside good. Train schedules? Gimme?" And after a moment, belatedly so, she added, "Please?"

Nathan laughed softly and came in, handing her the schedules. "I live to be your gopher," he said drolly. "I really do. Can I see the Great Plan? Remember we only have a Great Plan because Mac loves me."

"Will not bite. Nearly done with review." The beckoning hand gesture changed to point in the general vicinity of one of the chairs. "Sit. Show after. Almost... done..." If it would have been possible to have her nose glued to the screen, Alison would have done it - but as it was, that would have meant not seeing well enough at all, so instead she contented herself with excluding nearly everythign else until she was done, save for holding the schedules Nathan had obligingly placed in her hand carefully.

Nathan sank down in one of the chairs, raising an eyebrow as she continued to all but ignore him. She was concentrating very hard - he didn't need to be a telepath to pick up on that - but judging by how satisfied Scott had looked when Nathan had passed him in the hall, things were in order as far as he was concerned. Alison was probably just making sure she had all the i's dotted and t's crossed.

"Okay," she finally said after a moment, though even then she still lingering with her eyes turned towards the screen before reaching forward to turn the screen in Nathan's direction "Right. Done. We're good." She shook her head a bit, as though to clear her mind, then turned to look at Nathan. "Have a looksee!"

He leaned forward, skimming the file quickly. "Looks good..." Focused around rescuing the young mutant in question, of course, and it looked like the plan was taking into account all the variables he could imagine, plus several more he hadn't seen. "This should work well. Low manpower demands, too, all things considered..." He trailed off, shaking his head a bit wistfully. "Not that I disagree with making the rescue the priority here, but damn... wouldn't it be good to be able to use this against him, somehow? Gideon, I mean. More directly."

"Well, yeah, except that we have a-" Alison paused for a moment then frowned a bit, before going on, "we have a set window of opportunity and..." Eyes unfocusing, she tilted her head to the side slightly. "And... huh." After a moment of silence she reached out and pulled the keyboard closer, adding a single line within the document, then turned to raise an eyebrow at Nathan.

Nathan's eyes went wide as he looked at the additional line. "Oh... hell. Brilliant. Just... oh, brilliant, even if it complicates things enormously... but if we could do it, and find a way to... no, someone..." He moved from his chair to one closer to hers. "Let's call Ororo and Scott back down here?"

She grinned and nodded once, sharply. "By all means, let's do that."