xp_logs | Angelo and Forge, Sunday evening

Angelo goes to visit his suitemate in medlab, and they talk about the weirdness of the weekend and their lives in general.

This was becoming a pattern, Angelo thought ruefully, stepping into the medlab room and heading for his suitemate's bed. If two times counted as a pattern, anyway, and he thought it kind of did.

The sound of the door roused Forge from a light nap. He cracked one eyelid to see the grey figure approaching. A moment of surprise washed over him before he recognized his surroundings, then Angelo. Wiping his face, he gave a weak smile. "Hey, Angelo. Guess what? I got chewed up by dinosaurs. How's your weekend been?"

"I only didn't get trampled by a herd of giant cows by ridin' one of them all the way to Central Park", Angelo said dryly, looking his friend over. "You know, if you were lookin' to break my medlab record, there were probably easier ways to do it..."

Chuckling, Forge pushed himself up to a sitting position. He'd have used the motorized capability of the infirmary bed, except that the motors in question now resided in his left knee. Wincing at the sudden twinge of pain his shoulder gave, he took a few deep breaths. "Wasn't looking to wind up here. I'd figured - hey, a big park full of supposedly-extinct plants. A nice, calm weekend. Plants don't riot, plants don't kidnap folks. Stupid dinosaurs."

"You can never, ever count on a nice calm weekend when it involves any of us", was the amused (with a tinge of worry) response. "That's what makes it so good when we get one."

Forge started to nod, then pressed a hand to his shoulder with a grimace. "No kidding. I promise not to complain about boring weekends for at least a month. I swear, if anything happens next weekend in Budapest, I'm just going to go live on a mountain in Siberia. Of course, then I'd probably be kidnapped by mutant polar bears who want the Romanoff dynasty restored..."

"Don't even joke about that or you'll make it happen. With the number of probability manipulators we've got around here..." He nodded at Forge's shoulder. "More chewin', or...?"

"Yeah - I kind of earned that one, though," Forge replied, indicating the bandage on his left shoulder, covering from his neck down to the metal of his arm. "Got hauled off by a bunch of little reptilian bastards who wanted to make lunch out of me. The little ones are pretty damn feisty when there's a lot of them. Doc Voght picked a tooth out of there, actually. Said it would've been infected a lot worse if Crystal hadn't done such a good job of washing it out and
stitching me up. She may be a, well, royal pain in the ass at times, but she's good in a tight situation. From what Marie and Garrison said, she didn't lose her composure even once, not even in the rough spots."

Angelo nodded, not really surprised. "Medusa's about the same - or she was in Smichov, anyway, even if that was rioters an' police, not dinosaurs. How'd you get out of it in one piece to be stitched up?"

"There's a saying," Forge said with a smile, "If they expect crude, go technical. If they expect technical, go crude. I went primitive - when you don't have high-tech at your disposal, you learn to appreciate the utility of a sharp stick and the will to survive. Managed to limp my way to a convenient medical supply shack, bandaged myself as best I could, and cannibalized my leg into a compound bow. I figured that if I could keep the dinos at bay, I'd be safer. Followed an allosaurus stampede to the campsite, passed the bow off to Laurie, and voila. My 'Doctor Livingston, I presume' adventure."

Angelo chuckled. "Whatever works, huh? Sharp sticks or bows made of cuttin' edge prosthetic technology... I was wonderin' what happened to your leg, seein' as metal's not exactly food."

Drawing back the sheet, Forge wiggled the makeshift prosthetic he'd cobbled together from whatever he could find in his infirmary room, namely the support rails and motors from the two beds. "You do the best you can with the resources at hand. And wait a minute, did you say giant cows?"

"An' the best you can is pretty damn good", Angelo returned, then nodded. "Giant cows. With very sharp horns, an' not happy about bein' in the city."

"Giddyap, gaucho?" Forge snorted. "Seems like everyone had their own little adventures from what I'm hearing. Did Nathan really chase pterodactyls around the Statue of Liberty?"

"He did", Angelo confirmed, laughing. "So did Monet an' Ororo, I think. Anyone that could fly. An' from what I heard, Cain threw Logan at one of them."

Forge covered his face with a hand. "We work with crazy people," he mumbled. "Lunatics. You're one of them, you even have the special lunatic suit. It's black, kind of shiny?"

...yeah, still laughing. "An' you do high-tech support for lunatics. But hey, it's a hell of a lot of fun sometimes."

"Hoist by my own petard," Forge groaned, leaning back into his pillow. "And yeah. It's good work. You guys are crazy, but you're putting the crazy to good use, no matter what anyone says. Some folks - the Amaquelins, for instance - might not think highly of the team, but that's because they've never seen what good you can do." And because they've got a highly overdeveloped sense of arrogant entitlement, he left unvoiced.

Angelo shrugged. "The jokes don't really matter, 'cause... yeah, we know what we do, even if some of the kids - an' not kids - don't. Couldn't do it without half of what you put together, either."

"You speak the truth," Forge agreed, rolling to one side, and then levering himself out of the bed to stand on the floor. "Well, Amelia took the IV out an hour ago, and I can pretty much stand up without falling over. I am officially checking myself out of here."

"'Pretty much'?" Angelo echoed, eyeing him dubiously. "Please tell me it's just 'cause that leg isn't top standard, not 'cause you're dizzy or anythin'."

"It's the leg," Forge insisted. "I'm not Nathan, I can get through a weekend without dumping myself on my face."

One step forward, however, and Forge would have done just that, had Angelo not caught him first. "Or," the young inventor said weakly, "I could be wrong."

"...right. Far be it from me to keep anyone down here if they want to leave, but... I had nothin' to do with you checkin' yourself out if Dr. Voght comes lookin' for you. Or with you gettin' up the stairs."

"Think I may give it a few hours. Doctors know best, that's what I always say," Forge complained, managing to flop awkwardly back onto the bed without straining his shoulder much. "Besides, I pass out in the hall and someone's going to think we're under another psychic invasion. And I'm sorry, but two is my limit on those."

"...that says some very scary things about our lives", was the wry response. "Most people'd set the limit at one."

"What can I say, I have a sexy brain. Crazies just can't get enough."