xp_logs | Ororo, Scott, and Charles

When the world is going crazy around you, it's understandable that you might have difficulty coping. Ororo's doing just fine, though, and she's tired of people assuming otherwise. Unfortunately, the Professor is the next person to do so, and she gets a little... heated in her denial.

A gaggle of children nearly bowled Ororo over as she reached the door to the Professor's office; apparently she had timed her visit concurrent to the end of one of his classes. She stepped to one side and let them pass, even the last few stragglers, before stepping inside and closing the door behind her. "They always seem so glad to leave," she quipped, giving him a tired smile. "It makes me wonder if they listen at all, or if all their attention is focused on the ticking of the clock."

Charles smiled back at her. "It depends on the day," he said warmly, if a bit wryly, "and any number of other factors, I'm afraid. Please sit down, Ororo. Tea?"

"No, thank you. I cannot stay too long." She took a seat nonetheless, setting a folder down between them. "Here are the specifications that Henry put together for the Danger Room... he assures me that they will easily be adapted into our existing scenarios, as well as giving us room to expand in programming new ones."

"Ah, yes." Charles didn't reach out for the folder, however. "I have faith that Hank's upgrade will serve the team's training needs well." His gaze lingered on her face, calm but concerned. "I'm sure that it will not require your direct attention, however."

It was all Ororo could do not to give him an incredulous look. "I am meeting with Sam later to go over this... but I wanted to be well-informed before passing it on to him." Besides, when something happens to him, someone will have to pick up the slack.

"On another matter," Charles said, finally reaching out for the folder - but only to place it atop some others, "I've spoken to David, and he will be looking after some of the associated small tasks relating to our newest patient as well. Making announcements to the staff and the like, if they become necessary."

"Oh." Ororo nodded automatically, though a moment later a frown passed over her face. "Are you sure that is necessary? He is no longer officially a counselor, and there is no need to push him into things if he wishes to relax his responsibilities."

"I find," Charles said, and if there was a dry edge to his voice it was barely perceptible, and more than outweighed by the deepening concern in his eyes as he continued to study her, "that I rarely need to push any of you into anything, Ororo. I tend to think that perhaps the problem is that I sit back and watch you all push yourselves too hard."

He wasn't talking about her. He couldn't be. Scott, definitely, and David, and Nathan, and a dozen other residents of the mansion, but not her. She was only doing what had to be done. "Then you should tell David that he does not need to push himself like that. I will speak with him myself, if you like. It is no trouble for me to do it," she said, the faintest bit of defensiveness creeping into her voice and posture.

"I believe taking on this responsibility is something that he will welcome," Charles said. "I also believe that he will welcome the opportunity to free you from the necessity of attending to some of these smaller details. It has been a very difficult summer," Charles went softly. "For all of us. But I think perhaps you have been bearing a great deal of the load."

He was talking about her. "There has not been much choice," Ororo replied, a bit more sharply than she had intended. "I have done what I needed to do. So far it has been enough to keep things running, so I will continue to do that. I will thank David for helping, as well. He is very generous."

"There are always choices, Ororo." He was looking at her with something close to outright compassion, now, real worry lurking behind it. Charles Xavier had seen more than one of his oldest students buckle this year beneath all the weight of the responsibilities and duties they had taken on freely. "I have," he said, almost heavily, "the most distressing sense of deja vu, sitting here. But I will limit myself to pointing out that as things are mostly settled, at least for the moment, you should feel free to take some time for yourself, Ororo. Your teammates would step in to cover your duties, if they were asked."

Settled? Here? "Do you really think I would ask someone else to do this?" Ororo said, growing more agitated by the minute. "After I have seen what it has done to others? I am strong enough to handle this, Charles, I can do it... why does everyone seem to doubt that?" Over the lake clouds gathered quickly, the sky darkening until the sun could not be seen through the gray. "I have made mistakes, I admit, grievous ones, but I will not repeat them, and I will not simply give up because other people do not believe I am capable of doing my job."

"Ororo." Charles's voice was steady, soothing. "You have done, and continue to do, an exceptional job. With the team, with the school..." He stopped, sighed softly, then went on. "I could not be prouder of you, for everything you have accomplished. For what a pillar of strength you have been, for your teammates and for the students. But I worry about the cost to you."

She was acting irrationally, she knew, and for once she didn't care. Despite Charles' soothing tone and words, she couldn't help feeling once again like a chastised teenager who was being asked to consider her actions and their repercussions and then promise never to do them again. "I have no choice," she said through gritted teeth. "There is no one else to put this on. They have problems of their own... no one here is stable! At least I can face these things without turning away, or hurting my teammates, or destroying a bar. Do you think I could take time for myself, knowing what might await me when I returned? I cannot do that, not to them, not to the students, not to anybody. There is no choice there!"

Charles's gaze shifted to the window, where the trees just outside were beginning to lash at the glass under the force of the gathering winds. "I believe there is more flexibility in this situation than you're seeing," he said, looking back at her. "There are choices. There are ways to do the work you've chosen without losing yourself in the process."

"I am not lost! This is who I am!" All I am. Like Kurt, like Scott... who was she without this? Her old life was gone, and this was all that remained to her. She wouldn't know what to do with herself with time, with choices. "You sit there and say this, but you cannot show me anyone who has done it, not even yourself." The growl of thunder outside echoed her words. She couldn't believe she was saying all this, but it just poured out.

"That does not mean we cannot learn. We must learn, Ororo," Charles said, something close to real pain in his voice for a moment. "I will not sit by and watch more of the people dearest to me in this life burn themselves out because of my inability to teach them how to find that balance!"

On the other side of the office, the door opened. "... well," Scott said, stepping in. "That was a hell of a line to walk in on." He smiled faintly at both of them. "Ororo, there are whitecaps on the lake."

Ororo turned to look at him, her cheeks flushed and her hands gripping the arms of the chair rather tightly. "I am sorry," she muttered, taking a deep breath. "I was... not in control of what was happening." She glanced back at the Professor, meeting his eyes guiltily. "Or of what I was saying."

"At least you didn't shout at him for putting you into this position," Scott murmured wryly, sinking into the chair next to hers. "I did that in my version of this conversation."

"I would much rather that both of you shout at me, whatever that shouting involves, rather than see either of you internalize your feelings until there is no option but to explode," Charles said, a flicker of what might have been frustration in his eyes for a moment as he regarded the two of them.

Ororo opened her mouth to protest that she hadn't 'exploded', but the angry sky outside mocked her into silence again. "I am sorry," she said at last, all the frustration faded from her voice. "It is difficult to think that any good will come of speaking of such things. Even doing does not seem adequate, some of the time."

"We can't go on like this." Scott paused, then shook his head, resting it in his hand for a moment. "Damn, that sounded melodramatic. Bear with me, though, I do have a point." He took a deep breath and looked up at Ororo. "I have no intention," he said, very calmly and clearly, "of taking the time I need to get my head back together only to see you implode trying to do my work on top of yours."

"Just as I have no intention," she countered, "of allowing you to ruin any sanity you might have gained by coming back to work before you are ready."

"I had mentioned the sense of deja vu?" Charles said, dryly. "Of course, several years ago it was a matter of the two of you arguing over whose idea it had been to 'borrow' the car."

Ororo squirmed in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest. "Scott, compared to what you have been through, my frustrations are nothing. I am perfectly capable of managing for the time being. Despite what anyone else may say." She gave Charles a look, as if trying to tell him that inviting Scott here for this had been cheating.

"Let's be honest, Ororo." Scott shifted in his chair, slouching a little. "You may be managing without me, at least out in the field, for considerably more than 'the time being'."

"And that is fine," she hurried to assure him. Despite the terrible job I am doing. "I do not mind, at all."

Charles was looking back and forth between them, as if catching everything that wasn't being said, as well as what was. "There are other options," he said. "There are many different kinds of work that go into the job... the jobs that the two of you do."

"You are taking his side, aren't you?" Ororo said petulantly.

But Scott was looking thoughtful. "How much time since I've been... off," he said after a moment, "do you think that you've been spending writing Danger Room scenarios? Or tactical reviews? Or working with the trainees? How many hours a week?"

"Not as many as I should have been." At a look from Scott, she scowled and shook her head. "I do not know, honestly. As many as possible... ten, perhaps?"

"And feeling as if that's insufficient, right? As if you're shorting that side of things because everything else has been busy blowing up in your face."

Charles just watched the two of them. His gaze was intent, but he made no move to interrupt them.

Yes," Ororo said slowly. "It has not been at the top of my list of priorities lately, it is true."

Scott leaned back in the chair, staring down at the floor of Charles's office for a moment, almost fixedly. "Then let me do it," he said softly. "It's like the Blackbird, you know. It's something I can do - something that isn't going to demand things from me that I can't give right now. It's something I'm still good at."

Her hand went to his arm in a reassuring gesture as she pondered this, lips pursed. "You are sure about this?" she asked finally. "And I am asking about you, not what you think I need in this instance."

He looked up at her. "I still believe in what we're doing," he said quietly. "Even if I know I can't play the role I used to right now. This would let me make a contribution... and maybe help me figure out if I do want to go back to doing what I was doing." His mouth twisted briefly. "Somewhere down the line."

Charles looked pained at the bitterness that surfaced in Scott's voice, but when he spoke, his own voice was steady. "Would that be of help to you, Ororo? With the demands on your... energy, as well as your time?"

"If Scott is sure it is what he wants to do," she replied. "I do not doubt that the trainees would benefit from it as well... Especially one like Angelo. And I would be foolish to say that it would not help me."

"It would be a way of balancing the load again, at least a little." Scott didn't need to say that the hard decisions, the ones out in the field, would still be on Ororo's shoulders. Oddly, he didn't feel particularly guilty about that, either. "I don't really need all the free time I have these days, Ororo. That's why I let Charles talk me into playing his Washington gofer, too-"

"Scott."

"-pardon me, representing the school at the occasional conference and so forth in DC." Scott's smile was humorless, this time. "Jean would be double-taking at the idea."
Ororo raised her eyebrows, glancing from Scott to Charles and back again. "Better you than me, I think. American politics are a game I do not think I could play. When will you be starting?"

"There's a conference next week, actually. I'll just be gone overnight." He reached out and laid a hand on hers for a moment, squeezing it. "See?" he asked, almost lightly. "There's a way to diversify. It doesn't have to be all disaster, all the time. It just feels like that's been the way of things lately."

"It's a start, perhaps," Charles murmured, still watching both of them. "I have always thought that the two of you are happier in your work when you're working together."

"Seeing as it is Scott's fault that I am here at all," Ororo said dryly, rolling her eyes, "I should think so."

"Then there is perhaps one thing left to say." Charles gazed at them steadily. "I will refrain from suggesting shipping either of you to Aruba for a vacation if you both remember that you can have a life here, as well, that is not always about work."

"Hey, I'm doing my part. Tormenting the horses with my sax on a regular basis," Scott said flippantly, and then looked sideways at Ororo. "And you and I made a deal over ice cream, actually."

She looked confused for a moment, then remembered their agreement. "Yes, being social like normal people... I am still amenable to trying that if you are." Outside, the sky was nearly back to normal, the only evidence of her earlier agitation a few fallen branches and damp pathways.

"This sounds like an excellent agreement to me." Charles smiled, but then grew serious again. "But it is only a start," he said. "Please, both of you... tell me, as we go forward, if more needs to be done. The work you do is important, but so are you, Scott and Ororo. Not as Cyclops and Storm, but as yourselves. You deserve to be happy, to look forward to each new day instead of wondering what catastrophe will descend next."

"Unless you plan to expel all the students and disband the team, Professor, I think there will always be a little of catastrophe in our lives," Ororo said, glancing at Scott. "But we will try to remember that."