Scott and Jean, Monday night

[x-cyclops.livejournal.com]

There are places and times that you don't have it all together, where frustration and worry and bleak contemplation of the general hostility of the universe and semi-endearing lunacy can all coexist. The Summers-Grey suite, not surprisingly, is one of those places.


Jean looked up at the sudden noise, blinking. "Scott, why did you just go argh?" Setting her notes down on the coffee table, she stood up, moving to where Scott was sitting with his computer.

Scott looked up from his computer, blinking at her, and then sighed. "Pietro's determined to stay in Portugal until he finds something," he said quietly.

"Oh..." Jean's voice was just as quiet as she lay a hand on his shoulder. "Can you blame him?"

"I can't blame him. But I could wish his common sense won out over his natural persistence," Scott said, trying not to shift at the hand on his shoulder. This whole thing brought back some rather unpleasant resonances. "But then, I suppose the common sense approach isn't always the right one..."

There were, indeed, some rather obvious and painful parallels. "Natural persistence combined with a bone deep need to fix it... Common sense had no chance."

Scott closed the laptop, setting it aside and rising. "I'm hoping this doesn't go on too long. I'd hate to have to go drag him back home." It didn't come out sounding quite as light as he'd intended, and Scott made a face as he went into the kitchenette, getting the milk out of the fridge and a saucer out of the cupboard. Des appeared from seemingly nowhere, leaping to the top of the counter and waiting expectantly.

"He'll kick up quite a fuss if you do, you know. There may be actually kicking involved, at that." Jean turned, leaning a hip against the back of the abandoned chair and watching Scott.

Scott just raised an eyebrow. "I'd plan for the kicking," he said, filling the saucer. He returned the milk to the fridge, one hand going up to rub the scars on his face as he turned back towards Jean. "I was thinking, you know, about Forge convincing me to try the prosthesis."

"You plan for everything," Jean said, shrugging slightly. "I wasn't worried." She frowned slightly as he fussed at the scars, but simply asked, "Oh? What's the connection?"

Scott shrugged a bit unhappily. "Nothing. Just came to mind... I know that we don't know whether the island and its population are intact, just somewhere... else. But Forge's parents showing up today got me thinking about everything he's done, since he came to the school... the people he's helped. And now he's possibly dead, because he happened to be catching a later flight to somewhere else."

Jean's mouth twisted down further, but she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Opening them again she said, "There's still too many questions. I kind of agree with Pietro, in a way - we need to know more about what happened, any way we can. Having him looking in Portugal... it may help. We don't know."

"Yes, because the lone wolf crap always helps," Scott said, and although he didn't intend to snap at her, it sure as hell came out sounding like he had.

Jean arched an eyebrow at him. "Perhaps an entire team in Portugal, then, to help with the searchers," she said dryly.

"And do what? Scan the minds of the people pulling pieces of bodies out of the wreckage of that plane? Send Cain walking along the sea bottom to see if he spots anything the probe missed?" Des raised her head and blinked at them, but then went back to lapping up her milk. "There's no point to it, Jean. This is shaping up to look a hell of a lot like that Asgard incident, honestly."

"I wasn't here when that happened, so I'll have to take your word, but I don't know what searchers would do, or what they'd turn up. That's kind of the point of looking - you don't know what you're going to find, or how or if it will help." There wasn't any real heat to her voice; Jean was more than a little too tired and worried to really argue with him.

Scott clamped down hard on the flash of more-or-less irrational anger her response provoked. "Charles has been searching. Pietro's got as much evidence as the pretty comprehensive investigation has managed to turn up in a week. I could send a team to Portugal to help him look. Maybe I should. But they're going to come home empty-handed if I do, I can just about guarantee it, and I honestly don't think any of us can take much more goddamned futility this year." His expression twisted and he turned away, leaving the cat with her milk and Jean standing by the chair as he headed into the bedroom.

Jean was seriously tempted to stamp her foot and go storming after him, but she knew it wasn't going to do anyone any good. Honestly, she hadn't meant the suggestion of sending a team, except in that it had been a response to Scott's objection to Pietro's lone wolf tendencies. She didn't know what to do about Attilan and she didn't know what to do about Pietro. Scott was right, it was the futility that was making them all crazy. "Heya, Des," she said, moving into the kitchen to pet the cat briefly. "You've got it good, you know that."

Inside the bedroom, Scott sat down on the edge of the bed, closing his eyes in a futile - hah, bloody hah - attempt to shut out the world for a moment so he could remember that he didn't get the privilege of giving in to frustration.

It didn't work very well. The faces of Forge's parents as he led them in to talk to Charles came right back to mind, and Scott opened his eyes again, staring bleakly at the darkness beyond the window.

Hard enough telling parents their kids were hurt, or kidnapped, or brainwashed... He'd never had to face parents whose child was very possibly dead, before.

Jean actually had, having done a stint in the pediatric ward during her residency. But that wasn't what was helping her. If anything, it was the very uncertainty that helped Jean. They didn't know, and as long as they didn't know, there was still hope.

Eventually, Des had finished her milk and she'd cleaned up the saucer, drying it and setting it back in the cupboard before collecting the little cat and finally following Scott into the bedroom. Des she let go on the bed, where the cat immediately went to curl up on Jean's pillow, but Jean herself settled silently into one of the chairs.

Scott was still sitting where he'd been. "I'm sorry," he said after a moment, his voice sounding curiously drained. "I didn't mean to snap."

"It's all right," Jean said quietly.

"I'm very tired of this, you know." Still no expression in his voice. "I feel like I'm on auto-pilot lately. I walk, talk, and empathize on demand, but it's all just going through the motions." He looked over at her, the line of his jaw tight. "We are barely keeping our heads above water here. This is beyond insane, Jean. We've had kids kidnapped more than once in 2007, and we're six months in."

Jean reached up to rub at her temples. "We've always known we were targets, from the very beginning. And as we get bigger, and the world becomes more aware of us, it just gets worse. It doesn't make it better. Hell, it may make it worse, but there it is."

"I can hate the futility without letting it affect my choices," Scott said, not missing the temple-rubbing - and shielding the link more carefully. No point in giving her his headache. "We may not make much headway, but if we don't try, things'll just get even worse." He smiled a bit faintly. "If we've got to fight a holding action, so be it. I said something to Garrison once, earlier this year, about not expecting anything beyond being able to save what we can. I should take my own advice."

"You should. You tend to give good advice." The smile was reassuring to see.

Scott sighed and rubbed his hands over his face, lingering on the scars again, rubbing hard enough to turn them momentarily white. "You know," he said almost conversationally, "enough of this. Feels too much like self-pity. Any moment now I'll be going 'Why me?' and mooning over pictures of Alaska." He took a deep breath, meeting her eyes with a smile that was a little closer to normal. "We need to start thinking tomorrow about summer activities, again. Get the kids that are still here out of reaction-mode, at least a little."

"What would you think about a camping trip? I mean, as long as there's no crazy, gender-bending counselors." Scott might be forcing himself to lighten the mood, but it did work, and Jean could feel the tension bleeding out of the air.

"I think it would be a good idea. And I'd looked into whitewater rafting..." Scott paused, thinking. "I can't remember what else was on my list right now," he said, chagrined. "It's filed somewhere, though..."

"Well, if it's properly filed, and if you filed it I can't imagine it's not, then you'll be able to find it tomorrow," Jean said, smiling slightly. "It's late. Don't go poking through the file cabinet now..."

"But filing is soothing." Scott laid back, staring up at the ceiling, his lips twitching. "It soothes the headmaster's soul. Mmm, files. They're so... plentiful. And papery."

Jean shook her head, then stood up and crossed to the bed, crawling up onto it to sit, straddling his hips. "You're mad, love. The files have driven you completely round the bend. It's so unfortunate."

"Hush," he scolded, fixing his gaze on the ceiling and donning a deliberately dreamy expression. "I can hear them singing. They're calling my name. 'Scooooott, leave the redhead. We love you more, Scooooott.'"

Jean smothered a snicker and, once more composed, haughtily informed him, "They lie, you know. They'll throw you over for Ororo first chance they get, and you'll come crawling back to find that Des and I are perfectly happy with only Horatio for male company. That's what you'll get."

"That sounds so very wrong, you know. Just think of how much more therapy I'd need if I came back to find you and the fuzzball in a menage a trois with the turtle."

Jean shuddered delicately. "Please don't picture things like that. It's more than a little disturbing." Sighing, she shrugged theatrically.

"Well, I think you know what the solution is. To stave off the therapy bills and so on, you're just going to have to forego your illicit file affair and concentrate only on me."

"You have a definite edge over the files," Scott said, and managed one of those sort-of-pounces-from-a-prone-position that always wound up with Jean on the bed and him back on top. "Many edges. And curves, too."

"I really think it's the curves which put me in the lead, yes," Jean said, grinning up at him.

"I don't know. I kind of like the edges, too. They can be all kinds of fun," Scott said with a perfectly straight face - and kissed her, before either of them could burst out laughing.