Ororo/Lorna, various location. With cameo by Scott.

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After speaking to Crystal, Lorna finishes out her day by descending upon Ororo in her office. She brings courage with her--the liquid kind.



If Lorna had been the woman she was looking for, she'd have turned in her resignation already and be on a plane to Rio. Or perhaps Milan. They had great shoes in Milan. But Ororo was a bit more steady and long-suffering than Lorna. Or at least encumbered with a greater sense of duty so Lorna took herself down to Ororo's office instead and knocked on the door. "'Ro? You in?" she called.

"Yes, I am here. Please, come in," came the reply. When Lorna opened the door she could see that Ororo was indeed at her desk, though there didn't seem to be much work spread out in front of her. She looked away from her computer screen, smiling a bit as she saw Lorna. "Please, make yourself comfortable."

Lorna did, setting twin wine glasses Ororo's desk and uncorking a bottle of merlot. "I figured this would help make today less 'kill me now'." She poured as she explained and offered one glass to Ororo. "I just talked to Crystal. Have you watched the tapes?"

"Yes, I have." Ororo set the glass down in front of herself, smile quickly fading. "Thank you for bringing them to my attention."

"I like to share the pain," Lorna dismissed the gratitude with a shrug of one shoulder. It was her job after all. It was like being thanked for making dinner or cleaning up when her cooking classes exploded their spaghetti sauces. "Anyway, so I talked to our girl of the hour. She says that she wasn't trying to hurt Logan, just show him that she's bigger and tougher. I'm paraphrasing, of course." Lorna sipped at the merlot and gave it an approving look before continuing, "I didn't ask her if she was aware that healing factor doesn't mean immune to pain but heck, she's hardly the first to want to strangle Logan."

"There is a grave difference between wanting to and actually doing so," the headmistress said, the disapproval easy to read in her voice. "We must be held even more accountable for the damage we do just because of who we are... students are here to learn that, and learn to control themselves. What happened between Logan and Crystal goes against the very nature of this school."

"Yeah, that was...just entirely the wrong side of chilling and horrifying. Torture just because someone will heal from it? No respect for teachers? I mean, his methods of teaching children are nine different ways of abusive, insulting, demeaning, and inappropriate. I'm not trying to excuse Logan. In fact, I'm begging you to tell me he's not getting near another student until he's had a personality transplant. But yikes, I'm never making that girl mad." Lorna shuddered.

Ororo frowned, fingers curling around the stem of the glass. "Fear should never enter the equation here, on either side. I cannot say for certain what will happen with Logan, but it is my desire that he will not enter a classroom in a teaching capacity as long as I am headmistress," she said coldly.

"I'm so totally for that," Lorna shook her head and winced. "Christ, I just...I didn't really try to get too much into her head on this one. Just asked her what she was thinking and got her side of it. She was insulted and after he rushed her, felt threatened." Lorna sighed, "Which you really can't blame her for."

"Yes, but. It should not have gotten to that point at all. Which, from the tapes, seems like it was as much her doing as it was his." Ororo picked up her glass and took a drink, the quality of the vintage barely registering with her at the moment.

"Entitlement complex. Just like the princesses I went to school with. Man, I don't miss high school at all." She refilled her own glass from the bottle on the desk. "This is the second day in a row that she's missed Cooking--she claimed that she was too upset and didn't want to ruin the kitchen by losing her temper."

Ororo sighed. "Clearly, much remains for Crystal to learn. As reprehensible as her actions were, she needs guidance and help from us. It seems ironic that she out of all the students needs to be punished for mis-using her powers."

"Teenagers, they always think they know everything. She's too good to know how much she still needs to learn." Lorna made faces at her wine. "This so isn't good enough for this. Wanna go to Harry's and get smashed? I'll buy your first drink."


*~*~*~*

Merlot isn't quite enough so they move their meeting offsite. They get slightly off-topic.



"...perhaps you ought to assign her to clean all your dishes, by hand, after every cooking class," Ororo suggested with an evil, if intoxicated, look in her eye. "That ought to teach her something." Though it wasn't like her to speak ill of any student, but really now. The events of the week and the alcohol she had been consuming gave her more than enough motivation to now.

Lorna giggled, "Negative reinforcement. Then she'll hate me instead. And when I end up in the infirmary, I can sue her whole country for damages. Countries are rich, right?"

"Oh, most certainly," Ororo agreed. "They have to be, to have things like police forces and economies and... subways."

"Subways are scary and unnatural. But expensive too. Bet they're like millions." Lorna nodded decisively and lifted her glass for another drink and pouted when she found it empty. "And there's probably, like, crown jewels too. I could have a diamond tiara."

"Princess Lorna? Now who is spoiled?" Ororo waved at Harry and held up two fingers, looking satisfied when he nodded and began to pour two more drinks for them.

"My daddy says I'm his princess," Lorna declared loftily and leaned back in her chair, head dangling back so her hair hung free. The room spun and she started to giggle. "And Alex always called me 'my lady'. My knight in swim trunks. Remy didn't though. He just called me chere like he calls everyone else."

"Perhaps if he had seen this tiara, he would've changed his tune. Although some men are notoriously thick... even a sparkling crown might not get noticed."

"I just don't think it's his style," Lorna replied and very carefully sat up, swaying slightly. She beamed at Harry as he brought their new drinks and whisked away the old glasses. "He's different. Not all over the top and florid and stuff." She lifted her cosmopolitan and admired the pale pink shade, "Well, except for that time in France."

"France?" 'Ro asked curiously. Despite being friends with both Remy and Lorna, she had heard little about their actual courtship. "Did he wear a top hat? Because I cannot imagine that."

"He was healed. We had dinner with a comte." Green eyes blinked slowly, "I don't think there was a top hat. There was dancing though. And he was all gallant and planning things and stuff. I didn't have anything to do but follow along."

"Ah." Ororo sipped at her drink now - it was so much easier to savor it over idle talk like this. "Well, dancing is nice. It is difficult to find a partner... to dance with, I mean. Kurt would, before, but I do not think he would appreciate being asked now."

"Jim and I go dancing. Samba and swing. He's a lot better than when we started. You could go with him. The samba class is fun." Lorna offered her best friend up without a second thought and saluted Ororo with her glass.

The white-haired woman snorted, shaking her head. "As if I have time for dancing. Thank you, though, I appreciate your offer of... Jim. But you two are far better-matched, I think."

Lorna dissolved into giggles, "That sounds so wrong when you say it. Like we're dating or something."

"Well, I do not think anyone would be surprised if you were," 'Ro said, fighting to keep from laughing herself. It wasn't that it was particularly funny, it was just that everything was more amusing now.

The idea was so absurd that Lorna fell off her chair, cackling madly. "I can think of someone who would be." Still snickering she climbed back up, "We're not. Totally not. Oh my god not, even. Hee."

Ororo's eyes widened as she watched Lorna fall, and she anxiously checked the other woman over for injuries before taking another drink. "I believe you," she said solemnly, nodding. "But still. I have my own tall, skinny crazy best friend. Oh! Speaking of which... we ought to get a ride back to the mansion."

Lorna took a bracing drink of her cosmo and nodded, still giggling, propped up on her free hand. "Yeah because driving right now, hoo, no way. We'd be all whoa, eeeeer, crash!" There were hand motions to accompany this but they didn't really seem to have anything to do with what she was describing.

"And I do not think I should try flying in this state... I would probably end up in a tree!" Ororo snorted again with laughter, fishing her cell phone out of her purse. "Now, be quiet when I call. I do not want him to think we are... drunk, or anything."

That struck Lorna as even funnier so it was that her muffled giggles leaked over the phone line despite her attempts to drown them with the rest of her drink.


*~*~*~*

Scott gets to mop up the inevitable collison of stressed out women and drink.



Really, this was payback, Scott thought, keeping a very straight face as he walked into Harry's. He needed to remember this night the next time he decided that getting drunk would be a good idea.

There they were, heads together over a table, silver and green. And giggling. It was audible from here. "Someone called for a pick-up?" he asked patiently as he made his way over to the table.

"Scott!" Ororo looked up, waving him over to the table though he was already halfway there. "That was fast. We were just finishing here... I think we were done discussing the situation, correct?" She looked at Lorna, trying to keep a straight face.

Lorna looked up Scott solemnly, eyes huge and innocent--and slightly glassy. "Hi Scott!" she chirped and slid out of her chair to give him a hug. "We're all done. Ready to go. Made lots of important decisions about how to handle the whole situation. And subways."

"Ah." There really wasn't much that one could say to that sort of comment. Or spontaneous hugs from his brother's ex-girlfriend, who was... not letting go. "Sounds like... a whole lot of fun."

"It was," Ororo agreed, standing and making her way over to Scott and Lorna. "Excuse me," she said, somehow managing to squeeze her way in between the two, smiling all the while. "My T.S.C.B.F.," she whispered loudly in Lorna's ear. "Go hug your own."

Lorna looked over at Ororo, very slowly and deliberately stuck her tongue out at her and rested her chin on Scott's shoulder. "You're cute. Not like Alex, he's really cute but cute. Ororo's all jealous of me right now." It was all delivered in the same half-giggled perfectly matter-of-fact tone.

"Yes, well." It struck him as more than moderately comedic. Two beautiful women hanging off him, and his relationship with both of them was as platonic as it was humanly possible to be. He thought of pointing that out to the men in the bar who were giving him envious looks, but there were more pressing concerns at the moment. "If it's required that I be gallant and carry the two of you out to the car, I regret to inform you that I can only take one at a time," he said in a bantering tone. "So you're going to have to flip for it."

"No fair, Lorna could easily rig that," 'Ro said with a pout, narrowing her eyes at the green-haired woman. "Couldn't you pick something less biased... like a bet on the weather? And I do not need any help getting to the car. I am perfectly capable of getting from here to there on my own power. It is only the driving we needed help with."

Lorna didn't even bother to look innocent at the accusation that she'd have cheated. She would have. "I don't need help either. You can carry 'Ro. She's light." Lorna pushed away from their bizarre three way glomp and swayed as she worked on standing on her own. "See! All good." She looked triumphant.

"Good is not precisely the word I'd have picked, but then, what fun is good?" Scott asked, waving at Harry as he followed the two more than slightly unsteady women out of the bar. "Oh, for a camera."