xp_logs | Amanda, Angelo; Amanda, Angelo and Marie

Amanda delivers the Berlin research to the Elpis offices and quizzes Angelo on Smichov.

"Hello? Anyone home? I've got papers!" Amanda called as she walked into the Elpis office, file bag slung over her shoulder. The beer and pizza she'd left in the car, having too much to juggle - she and Marie could always heat the food up again if the insulated box didn't do its job. "Nate? You about?"

"He's hungover", came the response from behind a head-high stack of books, files and other assorted detritus on Angelo's desk. "Dom took him out for tequila last night."

"Dom's in town?" Amanda's eyebrows rose, before she smiled broadly and she moved to give him a hug. "Hey, you. Still in one piece?"

He stood as she approached, leaning round the desk to hug her back. "Yeah, just about. How was Germany?"

"German. And dusty, but that was probably just the archive part," she told him, holding on tightly. "So... smoke inhalation, huh? How're you doing?" Pulling back, she looked carefully into his face. "Sleeping at all?"

He did look tired, and not just to those who knew what they were looking for. He nodded, though. "Some. An' it'll get better, it always does. Just... you know how it goes."

"Yeah, I do." She was looking a bit pinched and worn herself, and not just from work. Tennesee had been preying on her mind. "Too bad I can't give you the old faithful potion, huh? I know how much you hate the pills." Implicit in her statement was that the option of taking something was there, and she hoped he'd been taking it where necessary. "How bad was it over there? Looked pretty hellish on the telly."

"The meds are helpin'", he said quietly. "The dreams aren't every night, anyway. An' yeah, it was. The TV cameras didn't get the half of it."

She nodded, gratified he was getting help. Oh how far they'd both come, she thought, thinking of her email to Sofia. "Do you... did you want to talk about it?" she asked, a little uncertainly, not sure how far to push him these days. With a small smile, she added: "'S all the rage these days, talking about your issues. Bottling's so last week." The last was said with a hint of Mark's drawl.

He grinned faintly, settling back into his chair and kicking another one about a centimetre closer to her - it was the gesture that counted. "You probably already figured out a good bit of it, between what you saw on the TV an' the smoke inhalation. But... yeah, I probably should."

It was all the invitation she needed, turning the chair around and sitting on it backwards, her forearms across the back and her chin resting on them. "I read Nate's thing about what happened, so I got the basics," she said. "And since I didn't see tanks being chucked around, I'm guessing Nate held back 'cause of the political situation."

"More or less, yeah. Given what actually did end up settin' it all off, anythin' like that would've been... bad. I didn't even turn the image inducer off the whole time we were there, an' Medusa had to be careful about her hair."

Amanda winced a little. "Must've been hard," she said, watching him thoughtfully. "'Specially for Medusa - those Amaquelin girls are big on the mutant identity thing."

He shrugged. "Can't speak for her, but I've done harder things. When it comes down to armed cops who're arrestin' the guy you went to meet an' might only not be arrestin' you because you've got papers an' a right to be there... better not to be a mutant."

She nodded, and met his eyes for a moment. "Tho' then you've got the issue of sitting back and letting them arrest someone who hasn't done anything wrong as far as you know."

His eyes were dark, shadowed, as he looked back at her. "You do. But better that an' free, where you can maybe do somethin' about it, than arrested or worse yourself."

Biting her lip a little, she nodded again, mind skittering briefly to an abandoned cabin in Tennesee and Josh's face as he made his decision. She'd let him go, hadn't tried to stop him - she still wasn't positive it had been the best choice. It had been the necessary one, though. "And the fire?" she prompted gently, partly to avoid that train of thought, but also to keep Angelo talking. He'd improved over the years, but he still tended to bottle a bit much.

"The fire was half the neighbourhood, by the end", he said grimly. "I was out there tryin' to get people out of the buildin's, with Nathan. An' there was this one buildin', a hotel I think... a little kid in one of the rooms, somethin' must've come through the window before the fire started, a stray bullet or two, I guess, his mom was dead... but he wasn't. But Nathan... how much d'you know about Tyler?"

The Brit paled. "Oh, fuck," she whispered, remembering a shared dream, a small boy with blonde hair, a brief image of a bloody bed. "I... met him once. Sort of. Back when Nate was doing that whole dream wandering thing. He found this kid and his mum, didn't he?"

Angelo nodded, looking... old. "Sent him right into a flashback. An' you know, the buildin' was burnin' down, not the best place for it, not to mention the kid wasn't dead, just hurt... I tried to snap him out of it, but in the end I just had to take the kid an' get out of there, an' come back for him after."

And with his issues with fire... Amanda sucked in a breath. "Fucking hell, Ange. When you confront a phobia, you don't do things by halves, do you?" she said, taking her usual route of making a joke. "How was the kid?"

"He lived, as far as I know", Angelo said quietly. "Kind of lost track of him after I left him at the clinic, but the doctor said he thought he'd be okay. An' Nate was already halfway down the stairs when I got back, so at least I didn't have to go all the way in..."

"But you would have." It wasn't a question. Amanda breathed out a long sigh, shaking her head. "Fuck, Ange," she repeated, tone holding an edge of respect.

"What else could I do?" he asked simply. "I wouldn't have left him in there the first time, if I hadn't had the kid to worry about. I didn't want to."

She smiled at him then. "You wouldn't be Sancho otherwise," she told him. Then she straightened, giving him an assessing look. "Right, that decides it. You're joining Marie and me for beer and pizza night." A grin broke out. "I promise, no makeovers."

"...what, tonight?" A faintly chagrined look at the stacks on his desk, then he shrugged. "What time?"

"Now." The grin was irrepressible. "Pizza's in my car and it's getting cold. C'mon, you need the break. 'Sides, I'm taking the bus out tomorrow, so you can work all day if you like."

He eyed her. "I'm gettin' dragged out of here if I say I've got too much to do, aren't I."

"Damn straight you are," she told him cheerfully.

Making good her promise, Amanda drags Angelo to Marie's suite for beer, pizza and winding down. All three of them need it.

Angelo in tow carrying the pizza, Amanda rapped cheerfully on Marie's door. When it opened, she held up the two six packs of beer. "Someone call for a sanity break?" she asked, grinning at the older girl. "I hope you don't mind - I made Ange an honorary girl for the night."

Marie grinned, gesturing the two to come in and go to the couch, a variety of munchies set up on the coffee table to accompany the pizza. "Does that mean we get to braid his hair and paint his nails?"

"My hair's not long enough to braid", Angelo declared firmly, walking in behind Amanda. "As for the nails, depends on the colour an' how good a bribe you come up with."

"There's always beer as a bribe?" Amanda pointed out with a laugh. Setting said beer down on the table, she grabbed Marie in a hug. "'S good to see you, by the way. 'S been way too long between pizza nights."

Marie tightened her arms around her friend. "It has. That's what happens when Ah have such a jet setting friend." She glanced over at Angelo as she released Amanda, smiling. "Ok, make that two jet setting friends. Man, what have we turned into?" she said with a laugh.

"Responsible adults", was the prompt answer, then, eyeing the beer and fully aware that he was still eight months from legality, "Well. Almost."

"Oh lord, and me the RA, contributing to the delinquency of youth," Marie replied with a grin. "Luckily, Ah officially took the night off and put Dani in charge." Entering the kitchen, she returned quickly with paper plates and napkins.

"Well, considering some of the stuff that's gone on this year, the youth're more in danger of corrupting us," Amanda replied with a snort, flopping onto the couch and unhooking three bottles of beer from the first six pack.

"An' here we were sayin' a couple of months ago there's no proper troublemakers in the lot", Angelo agreed, amused, dropping beside her and claiming one of the bottles.

"Murphy's Law," Amanda stated solemnly, before snickering. "Still, getting married in sodding Vegas is something I'm glad I never did. Talk about dumb things that fuck up your life." With a shake of her head, she looked up at Marie as the older girl joined them. "So, you said something about going to see your folks for this Thanksgiving thing?"

"Yeah," Marie said, the smile leaving her face. Reaching out to take a beer from Amanda, she sat down in one of the oversized armchairs. "They sent me a letter, inviting me home. Skin got to see me flip out. Ah...Ah probably shouldn't have as much. Ah just don't know what Ah think about them anymore."

Angelo reached over to flip one of the pizza boxes open, taking a slice. "Well, that's why you're goin' home, right? To figure it out."

"And you said it's just the day, yeah?" Amanda added, handing the beer over to Marie with a sympathetic smile. She was well aware of the irony - she'd just cut her ties with her birth parents, whilst Marie's adoptive status had been what caused the problems.

"Makes it easier to think about doing it, for just a day." She took the top off her beer, taking a long swallow of the amber liquid, before smiling apologetically at Amanda. "Then again, guess Ah shouldn't be complaining. They are trying...just wish they'd been honest with me. Makes it hard to believe anything from them now."

Amanda snorted again, this time the edge of bitterness hard to miss. "Yeah, well, they're trying to fix things, at least. Better than just throwing in the towel and writing you off."

"Yeah," Marie said noncommittally, taking another sip. Setting the bottle down, she grabbed a slice of pizza. "Though Ah still feel closest to my family here, y' know?"

"Oh, definitely." Amanda brightened, finally taking a drink of her beer instead of picking the label off, as she had been doing. "'S why I finally got around to changing my name legal-like - you lot know me as Amanda, and you're the ones that count, far as I'm concerned."

"Well, that, an' it's the name you always chose to use, right?" Angelo pointed out. "That's the part that matters."

"Yup, all that matters is what we choose," Marie said, brightening a little. "Which brings us to our movie selection for the evening. Ah'm afraid you're gonna have to suffer through a chick flick Skin, but at least we'll let you pick which one."

"Do I get to make you watch an action movie too? Fair's fair."

"See, someone should invent a chick flick with action," Amanda pointed out, reaching for a piece of pizza of her own. Luckily it hadn't gotten too cold. Pausing to wind a long string of melted cheese around her finger and stuff it in her mouth, she continued, a little indistinctly. "Imagine all those couples who wouldn't have to argue about what movie to see any more."

"Start marketing that and you can be rich and Angelo and I will live out our lives as your moocher friends," Marie said before taking a large bite of her pizza.

"Moocher friends who still work too hard", Angelo said cheerfully. "An' don't pretend you wouldn't, Marie."

"Now, that's the pot calling the kettle black," Amanda observed with an amused snort. "So, what've we got tonight, Marie? Something we'll need the tissues for?"

"Well, Ah'd been thinking a classic tonight...what are your thoughts on When Harry Met Sally?" Marie asked, turning to Angelo. "Or Ah also have Sense and Sensibility."

"Either one'll do", he said with mostly-mock resignation. "But again, only if I get to choose an action movie later."

"When Harry Met Sally's the one with her faking an orgasm in the restaurant, right?" Amanda asked, poking Angelo as she reached for her beer again. "Chuck that one on - I only like classic English lit when it's got the funny spelling."

Angelo just grinned, drinking from his own bottle. "Even for the actors?"

Marie somehow managed to juggle her pizza and beer well enough to throw a pillow at Angelo. Grinning, she set her beer down and grabbed the DVD to pop into the player. "Well, this one'll be more fun Ah think."

He swatted the pillow away casually, then rescued it from the floor. "Sure, let's watch that one. But I get the right to mock."

"And point and laugh," Amanda agreed. "Especially at the Eighties hair."

Marie flipped off the lights and then settled into the comfy chair for the movie, a smile on her face. This evening was just what she needed and she had a feeling the same was true for both her friends.

After the movie, Angelo naps and the girls talk.

She still had a smile on her face as the end credits started to roll across the screen. "See, was that really so bad Skin? Ange?"

Unfortunately or otherwise, the week or two of poor sleep - as well as the beer and the pizza - had caught up with Angelo, and he was curled up in his chair all but asleep. "Hm?" was the only response to his name.

Amanda snickered quietly and glanced at Marie, holding her finger to her lips. "Let him sleep," she murmured. "Looks like he hasn't been getting much."

"An' Ah doubt you have either," Marie said as she rose to her feet, and grabbed the throw blanket on the back of the couch. Tiptoeing over, she gently placed it over Angelo. "He's turnin' into a mini-Nate, y' know? Never taking enough time for himself."

Amanda shrugged, stretching along the couch with a content smile. "I'll catch up. Been a rough month at work." Her face softened as she glanced at Angelo. "'S why I dragged him out tonight. He was telling me about Smichov and all..." A hint of a frown crossed her face. "You know he went into a burning building? Twice?"

In the instant Marie blinked her eyes, she saw the flash of a memory - or really, the memory of another's memory - and she shuddered. "Wonder if he's having the dreams again," she mused, picking up the now empty pizza box and a couple of bottles.

"He is," Amanda confirmed, getting up to help Marie clear up - and to let Angelo sleep a little while he could. "At least he's taking care of it - I checked," she added with a slightly sheepish expression. "I'm trying not to hover, but... well, you know. I felt bad about taking off and leaving you lot at a bad time, too."

Marie nodded, a little sigh of relief at the information that Angelo was taking care of himself. "You have to do what's right for you. An' that's why there's more than one of us...there's always someone to lean on. If each of us dropped work or school or our lives every time there was a crisis, well," she grinned wryly at Amanda "we'd have less of a life than we already do."

"Well, there was a bit of running away involved," Amanda admitted, adding the bottles in her hands to the neat stack on the counter. "Things... didn't go to plan in Tennessee, and I just... I needed time to think it out. Hit a few buttons." She shrugged. "It helped. And I swallowed my pride and asked Sofia for counselling - there's issues someone out of the loop can't hear about. She was actually pretty decent about it."

Leaning the pizza box against the trash can, Marie nodded at Amanda's words. "You know, Ah really admire that you reached out when you felt you needed to talk to someone instead of just closing down. That's hard to do." Leaning against the counter, she kept her voice low to not wake up the sleeping man in her living room. "She wouldn't be a therapist if she wasn't good deep down, y' know?"

"Learned not to the hard way," Amanda said with a small smile. "Plus, after Kurt blowing up the way he did... 'S a family habit I didn't want to repeat." She shrugged a little. "Sofia's... hard to get to know. Holds herself back a lot. And I never react well to someone who gives the impression they think they're superior. But... I'm willing to try. Let bygones be bygones. 'Sides, some of the stuff we're getting involved in... I can't afford to be off my game."

"Wonder what makes her hold back," Marie mused. Most people she knew appeared standoffish for a reason. "Are things slowing down any for y'all? Givin' you a chance to catch your breath?"

"A bit. The name thing... it helped, weirdly enough. Made things more... settled? Like I was finally being myself." Amanda gave Marie a wry smile. "Not that I've been a Szardos for a while - Margali gave me the boot last December after that mess with the Hellfire Club."

"That's what's important then," Marie said. "If you're happy with your name and it makes you feel like you're more you, then that's good. Your name isn't really the important thing though, you being settled is." With that said, Marie stifled a yawn, then smiled apologetically at her friend.

Amanda smiled, waving away the implied apology. "Looks like we all should get some sleep - can I crash here tonight? Or I could sneak Angelo's room key out of his pocket and surprise Forge in the morning." She grinned wickedly.

"As much as Ah'd love to see the look on Forge's face, Ah think it's my couch for ya." Walking over to a small closet, Marie pulled out blankets and pillows. Passing Angelo, she grinned over at Amanda. "You know, he never said no about the nails...."