Jennie and Laurie log

[x-wallflower-.livejournal.com]

Note Posted early due to Timezone issues once again. :)

Jennie goes to find out why Laurie hasn't come back to the school yet.



Laurie looked up from the movie she was watching in the family room, pressing pause as she noticed Jennie standing in the doorway. She hadn't heard the doorbell, but then she supposed having Pirates of the Caribbean up loud would do that to a person.

"Hi." she said, placing the remote control down on the arm of the couch. "Mom let you in?"

"Actually no, came through the window." Jennie gestured behind her. "Those holly bushes are evil, I tell you."

It had taken nothing short of a miracle to send Jennie out the front door of Xavier's by herself. But she was being counted on, and she rather owed the student counselor for the whole "fixing her brain thing" so here she was. Relatively intact too, having only one small anxiety moment after she ran a yellow light.

Laurie's mother had been very nice to her, all things considered. Perhaps Laurie had explained the similarities in their situations. "Can I sit?" Jennie pointed to a nearby chair.

"Sure." Laurie replied, picking at the cuticles on her nails. "I could...well, would you like me to get you something to drink, maybe? Or, Mom made brownies the other day."

"I'm good." Jennie said, perching on the edge of the chair near the couch. Several seconds went by punctuated by the ticking of the clock in the hall. Jennie sighed. "Okay, there are certain people who are good at the gentle lead-up, but I'm not one of them. So. How are you? I know that this last month has not been a fun one for anyone. But you take off and don't come back?" Jennie shrugged. "I worry."

"Like a baby that's lost it's pacifier, only it's not the type that screams so it just sits there crying and looking at you like you're the only person in the world that can make it right again." Laurie replied, glancing over at Jennie. "I didn't want anyone to feel like they failed me because I couldn't be all better when we'd all been rescued and, sort of non-injured."

"Oh hon," Jennie tilted her head at Laurie. "That was one of the big problems I had too, after they brought me back. I couldn't understand why everyone was feeling so guilty. It wasn't anyone's fault but the person who took me." She leaned forward, putting her elbows on her knees. "I think people are going to understand if you're not okay right away. I don't think there's anyone there that doesn't empathise with you in some way." Unfortunately, she added to herself mentally.

"I know. I just needed my Mom for a bit. I feel safe here, I guess." Laurie replied, shifting so she could pull her legs up underneath her. "Not that the mansion isn't safe. Just, it doesn't have my Mom there."

"Yeah," Jennie said softly. She remembered asking the professor to tell her father to wait until all the side effects of the Hounds process had faded before he visited. She'd hated to do it, but she didn't want to frighten him. "You coming back, or staying here?"

"I don't know." Laurie replied honestly, sighing. "I want to but I'm scared to as well."

"This is a dumb question, but why?"

"Because I couldn't do anything to stop them from taking me, and then, then all I wanted to do was sit and wait for someone to come rescue me. It wasn't till Crystal talked me into it that I even wanted to help. I'm a coward, and I'll just get people killed."

That got a gentle snort from the older girl. "And yet somehow you saved yourselves. It's not cowardly to be frightened in a bad situation. And it was fortunate that you were not alone. Or ...unfortunate. Er. Anyway." Jennie sighed. She was so not the person to be doing this. Sharing was not in her nature. "Part of what I'm doing to get over what happened to me is being more proactive, in case a situation like that does arise again."

"Yeah?" Laurie asked, interested.

She'd been thinking of that, the last few days, the idea that if maybe she'd had more training...or something that it might have turned out differently. Although, both Angelo and Amanda were well trained and it hadn't gone any better for them.

"Uh, well," Jennie rubbed the back of her neck. "I did sort of sign up to be a trainee. For the X-Men. Cause, well," she looked down at her hands, feeling an involuntary stab of fear come over her. She couldn't get the look in that man's eyes out of her head. The hatred completely unfettered by anything resembling sanity. "Anything to make the world safer," she said quietly.

"You'll be great." Laurie replied, smiling. "I could never..."

She knew Jennie would make an excellent X-man; she had the drive to pull it off if it was something she really wanted. For Laurie, the answer wasn't in that sort of thing; it wasn't what she was cut out for. But, Jennie was right though, to find a way to help, to do something so the next time was different. Maybe she could find something, a way of being proactive without...the whole fighting thing.

"I was volunteering for the med lab, before everything happened. I don't think I could be an X-man but maybe I could be something else."

"Well, yeah. There was this other doctor, Madelyn Bartlet, before your time. She wasn't on the team but would go on missions as a medic, and had FBI training and stuff," Jennie stretched. "You could do that. You could even ask for more self defence classes or further your training to make them offensive."

"That sounds...pretty good actually." Laurie admitted, a slow smile appearing.

And it really did, something like that, she could help without having to fight. At least, not go in meaning to fight, which might seem just semantics when you got down to it but was important to her. She wasn't looking to be a hero, just to make a difference.

"World's not a safe place, not for us." Jennie said softly, before turning her head and looking at Laurie. "Perhaps maybe we could do something about that. What do you say?"

"I think we could really kick some ass." Laurie replied, grin fully evident now.