xp_logs | Ambush, Calvin & Hobbes Style (Forge/Angel)

Some folks go out for drinks to celebrate the return of a friend thought lost. Others lie in wait for an ambush.

The fantastic thing about the mansion was that it was crawling with good hiding spots. Lovely hidey holes that just begged to be used in cases such as this one. Angel hunkered down in the darkened lab, wiggling in excitement. She'd come down to find Forge as soon as she could but when she realized she had made it down there just minutes before he did...well. Not many chances like this one came along. Crouching as if to start sprinting, she grinned in the dark at the door.

Just a few more seconds...

Forge walked out of the lab, barely hearing the door hiss shut behind him. Two hours! Two hours it had taken to un-label all his lab notes and re-familiarize himself with the layout. Although despite his oft-voiced objections to his partner's organizational scheme, it was a nice familiar setting to come home to.

Completely absorbed in the inventory sheet in his hand, Forge stepped into the hallway.

As soon as he appeared in her line of sight, there was a mini-explosion of light and sound as Angel suddenly flared for a brief second. It propelled her off the floor and gave her enough oomph to hurtle straight at him. There was no fire when she collided with him, just a blur of teenaged girl limbs shrieking in delight.

Forge barely had time to tense up at the flash before being bodily tackled and tumbled down the polished metal hallway. When the rolling stopped, he looked up at the giggling redhead sitting triumphantly on his chest. Despite being completely out of breath, he managed a smile and a weak, "...well, hello..."

The grin on Angel's face stretched to hurting but she couldn't stop it. "Hello yourself, Mr. I Went to Another Dimension!" she replied, eyes nearly crossing as pages of inventory floated down to land on them. She ignored it and leaned down to hug him as tightly as being in a pile would allow. "What did you bring me?"

"My undying gratitude if you'll just let me breathe for a moment..." Forge gasped, managing to lever himself up into a sitting position. "And I think it's less of 'Went to Another Dimension' and more of 'Got Island-Napped into a Temporal Anomaly'. I like that more, mainly because I like saying 'anomaly'."

"Breathing was so yesterday but I guess you wouldn't have heard that." Angel sat back and eyed him. "And Island-Napped is fun to say as well." She said it a few times before giggling. "You don't look that much different. Just more...you know. Non-labby. How does the time thing work? Not that I'd care if you came back super old, like thirty, because you'd be back! But still..."

Forge took a moment to mentally translate Angel-speak into something coherent. "Oh, the time thing. It seemed to average around a one-to-twenty scale, most likely on a nonlinear progression due to interdimensional fluidity, which is really just a theory but I'd like to think I have a bit more firsthand experience now than the..." He stopped, looking slightly sheepish. "Um, two and a half years. For all intents and purposes, we're saying I just turned twenty-one. Rounding it off for ease of legal stuff and all that."

"Two and a half years..." The expression on her face went from manic to slightly watery. Angel sniffled suddenly. "It was hard enough on our end, not being that long, I can't imagine..." That was a long time. Two and a half years ago, she'd never have thought of mutants or "nonlinear progression" whatsis. "I missed you and Crystal and..." She threw herself at him again, wrapping her arms around his neck as she sniffled again, trying her best to not cry.

Again.

Forge made a small 'meep' noise, then cautiously patted Angel on the head. Then the mental image of the fiery redhead tackle-hugging Crystal entered his brain and he started giggling uncontrollably. "Ow... ribs hurt..." he breathed, snorting as he chuckled. "Trying to imagine... anyone hugging Crystal..."

The slightly pained giggles broke through Angel's brief dip into the sadness she'd thought she'd shaken off and she started to laugh frantically as well. "What?" she asked. "Can't see her suddenly piled on by her former roommates? Not even a little bit of a dogpile? I think she'd be smooshy and good to hug!" And now she couldn't stop laughing.

"Crystal?" Forge wheezed. "Did you hit your head? Crystal's about as smooshy as... as Logan. Although I'd like to see you guys try."

"I bet you anything that she's smooshy!" she responded immediately, trying to catch her breath. "And I think we're so going to have to try this. Just wrap Yvette up so she can hug too and I bet we could totally get her in a hug pile." The image of the entire girl suite being in a pile and only Crystal's feet and hands showing, waving around, set Angel off again.

Laughing, Forge rolled onto his heels and began picking up his papers. "Tell you what," he said. "If Princess Crystal makes it back here for a visit sometime, I will hold the camera to get that on record. But I absolve myself of responsibility for any international incidents you cause."

Angel snorted and scuttled after a page that had started to try and escape. "Oh, please. We're the cutest group of suitemates ever. That would get us out of any international incidents we cause." She grinned over at him. "And trust me, I'm only 15. I plan on causing a lot during my lifetime!" Handing him back the paper, she smacked herself in the head. "I've got a cupcake with your name on for your birthday. It's huge! Want to go and eat chocolate and you can tell me about the kidnapped island? Because all the good stuff always gets left out."

Fifteen? Forge echoed in his head. She'd been fifteen when he left and... of course she'd still be fifteen. He was going to seriously need to work through this weird slow-motion deja-vu with someone. It was one thing to intellectually understand that the rest of the world hadn't changed - had almost been standing still by comparison with Attilan. It was another entirely to experience it and feel like two and a half years had just vanished for him and for no one else around him.

"Chocolate is good," he said absently as he got to his feet. "Good stuff, good stuff... I learned to fish?"

There was a pause as she scrambled to her feet behind him. "Wait, fish as in a fishing pole or did you invent something to zap fish from the shore?" Angel asked innocently, snickering.

"Neither," Forge explained as he let Angel scamper up beside him and head for the kitchen. "Imagine the ugliest rustbucket fishing trawler in the harbor, then go out on it for days at a time and haul back a thousand or so pounds of fish. Took me four weeks to even get the hang of standing up on deck." He smiled and stopped by the door to the stairway. "This one time, we caught a marlin - ten feet long, I kid you not..."

Sure, it was a 'fish story', but it was the 'good stuff', after all.