Angelo and Nathan; Angelo and Amanda, Saturday night

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First, there is dinner at the boathouse, complete with a tense moment or two and philosophical conversation. Later, Amanda comes over for one final night before the mission in the morning.



When Angelo came through the boathouse door, Nathan was on the phone. "And what did you do then?" he asked, waving at Angelo to take a seat. Dinner was obviously on the go; there were some very promising smells coming from the kitchen. "You did? .... oh, did Mom? Well, you tell Mom from me that she's a big grouch."

Angelo smiled slightly at the conversation, obviously with Rachel, and moved forward to obediently sit at the table.

Nathan smiled slightly, most of his attention still on the phone. "... yeah, I thought it must be bedtime. Love you, munchkin. Put Mom back on?" A brief pause. "Yes, I will call you in the morning. Absolutely.... yes, I'm planning to sleep tonight. Yes. And eat. Moira, go to bed." The smile turned into a lopsided grin. "I love you too. Good night."

"Sounds like she's got even more words than last time I saw her", Angelo said as soon as the phone was hung up, amused.

"She's speaking in whole sentences now, yes. I can't always understand everything she says, although at least with me she fills in the blanks telepathically." Nathan's smile had vanished, and his expression was pensive as he turned back to the pots on the stove.

Angelo caught the tone in his voice, and his own smile disappeared. "That'd be a benefit, yeah", he said carefully. "Can't she do it with anyone else?"

"She's being mannerly. She does it with Moira, and Anna and Billie... but on the whole she's not as prone to sudden telepathic contact anymore. I suppose that's a good thing." Plates floated down from an open cupboard. "Alfredo or pesto sauce? I couldn't decide, so I made both."

"Alfredo?" Angelo suggested hopefully. "In the mood for somethin' unhealthy tonight."

"You're going to love dessert, then. I may have spent the last hour or two puttering around in the kitchen," Nathan said, dishing up the pasta. "Don't ask me why. I suppose I should be updating my will or something."

Angelo shrugged. "Only if you don't already have it up to date. Anyway, you should be doin' whatever you want."

"Yeah, well, what I want is to be with Moira and Rachel, but that's not happening." The comment about the will got a tiny smirk, though. Like any of them had out-of-date wills.

"It could", Angelo said quietly. "Clarice'd probably take you, tonight of all nights." That wasn't the only reason Nathan wouldn't or shouldn't go, though, he knew.

"We're all too worn out already. I can't ask her to do a cross-continental teleportation, let alone two." Nathan's voice was more brisk, at this point, as if he was putting thoughts of an evening on Muir well behind him. A plate of pasta came floating at Angelo, complete with silverware and a jar of parmesan cheese.

He caught them automatically, setting them in their various places on the table. "Thanks. Yeah, I know... it was just a thought."

"You heading to the brownstone tonight?" Nathan asked, coming over to the table with his own plate. "If you do, just remember Scott wants us in the Situation Room at 6am sharp for that last briefing."

Angelo shook his head. "Have been every other night, but... I think I'm gonna get Amanda to come here tonight. 's just easier, with the early start an' all."

Nathan nodded, and reached for the parmesan cheese, proceeding to shake far too much onto pasta that already had alfredo sauce on it. It seemed to be deliberate, at least.

"...you're really goin' all out with the unhealthy thing there, huh", Angelo observed mildly after a moment of watching this.

"I feel the need for cheese. It's an opiate, you know," Nathan said in his 'I'm being so chipper it hurts' voice.

"Cheese is not an opiate", Angelo retorted. "...well, maybe for you it is. Is it a dairy thing?"

"It breaks down into several chemicals when you digest it. Including something that's an opiate. I am the king of useless information. I also like cheese."

"I can see that." He left it open which part he was answering.

Nathan busied himself by winding spaghetti around his fork. "I wonder how it's going at our 'evacuation sites'. Hopefully the kids aren't too stressed."

"I've heard from Mom a couple times", Angelo told him. "She says the kids at hers are doin' okay... she's kind of worried about Kevin, but he said he'd tell her if he wanted to go to her place instead, get some space."

Nathan nodded, almost distractedly. "Well, hopefully it won't be too long before they can come back. Various parents are really stepping up to the plate, here... Charles is going to owe them a lot."

"It's their way to help. Even if we can't tell them why... yeah, they've been really good through all this."

"Hey, at least it gets the kids out of the house, too. That can't not be a good thing, right?" It was only a semi-facetious comment.

Angelo snorted. "I think I'd prefer somethin' more along the trips to the city line, but when you put it like that..."

"I'm trying to find the silver lining," was Nathan's retort, accompanied by a sigh. "God knows there's not much of one in the rest of this situation."

"There's always what we'll be stoppin', if this works." Angelo wasn't smiling, though, just watching Nathan with intent dark eyes.

"I know," Nathan conceded, and chewed and swallowed a bite of spaghetti before he continued. "I just think that maybe I've found a limit finally," he went on, almost reluctantly. "I'm going because of what's at stake here, but my focus isn't what it should be. I keep thinking about Rachel."

Angelo stared at him for a moment longer, then nodded reluctantly. "Mom an' Amanda. But there's no backin' out now."

"All of us have loved ones," Nathan said after a long moment, "but it's a bit different, with a child... it's competing responsibilities, and about the only thing that swayed me to go in the end was thinking about the type of world she'd have if we didn't stop Magneto."

"She'd be okay", Angelo said grimly. "If he didn't decide she was useful. But... yeah, the world really wouldn't be." He looked up. "You could still stay. Scott'd understand, even if he doesn't like it."

Nathan shook his head. "No, I couldn't." He smiled slightly. "No worries, I'm just having pre-mission qualms. To think I never used to get them."

"Well, this isn't the usual mission", Angelo pointed out. "Next one that's on the ground, you'll probably be fine."

"How about you?" Nathan said, raising an eyebrow. Turnabout was fair play.

"...yeah, I've thought twice about it", Angelo admitted as frankly as he was willing to. "But in the end, I've said I'll go, I'll see it through."

"Of course you will. You're the thousandth man," Nathan said, with a sudden flare of wry humor. "I guess we all are. Or at least that's we're supposed to be..."

Angelo blinked. "The thousandth man?"

"Rudyard Kipling?" Nathan said, then smiled a bit ruefully at Angelo's continued questioning look.

"His wrong's your wrong, and his right's your right,
In season or out of season.
Stand up and back it in all men's sight --
With that for your only reason!
Nine hundred and ninety-nine can't bide
The shame or mocking or laughter,
But the Thousandth Man will stand by your side
To the gallows-foot -- and after!"

"Oh. Didn't know that one - but yeah, that sounds about right. We're all supposed to be that for each other, huh? Or for everybody?"

"Either. Both. Both, I think," Nathan said.

*************************

Remy was going to send her to somewhere worse than Iowa, Amanda thought as she made her way up the stairs. Dodging out of comms set up, running back to the mansion to say goodbye to her boyfriend... she'd be lucky if Pete didn't get in on the lecturing as well. But sometimes you had to make a choice, and if she didn't get this, and something happened to him... She pushed the rest of the thought away. Tapping on the door to his suite, she wondered if he'd be there, or if she'd have to ask Forge to sneak her into the proper X-Men parts of the basement.

He was there, but the only sound from inside was creaking floorboards as someone moved. She'd only knocked quietly, after all, and Angelo was a little absorbed in a certain kind of preparation.

"Ange?" she called softly, not sure if it was him or Forge in there she could hear. She turned the doorknob, beginning to push the door open. "You in there?"

Once the door was open a crack, she could hear his voice more clearly, though it was soft, murmured Spanish coming from his bedroom.

Closing the door behind her, Amanda crossed to his bedroom. Her curiosity piqued, she didn't say anything else, pushing the slight-ajar door open to see what he was up to.

Angelo wasn't as devout a Catholic as some in the mansion, but he still went to church once a week when nothing else interfered, and in a crisis situation like this... well, anyone would find their need for faith a little stronger than usual. He was on his knees by the bed, carefully-stored rosary now between his hands, telling over the beads as he recited the prescribed prayers.

Amanda had once said religion wasn't unlike traditional magic, with the rituals and the chants and the props. Watching Angelo, listening to the soft Spanish, it struck her how trite that had been. Religion wasn't something she really understood, and Angelo didn't tend to be as upfront about it as, say, Kurt. But now she found a lump rising in her throat as the import of the small ritual struck home, and she wished that she had something, anything, to fall back on. To give her the strength she knew she was going to need if something happened to him.

He'd been at this for some time before she came by, and was almost at the end of the current set of decades. Knowing she was there, he still wouldn't interrupt himself, and finished the rosary before he turned to look up at her. "Hey."

She smiled at that. "Hey yourself," she said. "I got your message, got Mark to fill in for me... I didn't mean to interrupt."

"You didn't", he assured her. "I was done with that time round. I wanted you to come, anyway."

"'S why you pinged me," she replied, gently teasing as she came into the room properly to sit on the side of the bed. "So, tomorrow's the big day." She seemed at a loss as to what to say next.

"That it is", he said quietly. "We'll be headin' out early, I figure. Scott's given us the night off trainin' - we've probably got as trained as we're gonna, now."

"And you all need your sleep, I figure. All that going into space and all." She reached over and cupped the side of his face, running her thumb over his bottom lip. "I know I've already told you this, but... be careful? I've gotten used to having you around, and I'd like to keep that going."

He'd been about to get up and join her, but he stayed where he was now, kneeling beside where she sat. "I know. I'd kind of like to keep bein' around too, all things considered... I'll be as careful as I can. Promise."

"Thank you." The promise helped lessen some of the weight on her chest, even though she knew there were any number of things that could happen that were beyond him being careful. A slight pressure of her fingertips nudged him to come up and join her. "I still can't get my head around the fact you lot are going up into space to fight Magneto and the Brotherhood, you know. Seems like something out of a movie."

Angelo was only too ready to sit on the bed next to her, shoulder to shoulder. "I know. Some kind of fucked-up sci-fi thing... with a bit of soap opera thrown in, considerin' the links the Brotherhood's got to some people here."

Her hand reached for his, fingers entwining. She had to concentrate on not clutching at him. "All Our Mutant Children. Too bad Jamie's not still here, he'd have a perfect movie script."

He squeezed her hand, tight but carefully not too much so. "Well, hey, he's still an X-Man. Maybe he'll get to hear about it... but writin' a movie probably breaks all the secrecy laws."

"Who'd believe it was a true story? I know I wouldn't, if I hadn't been up to my ears in research the past few days." She laughed a little, then took a breath. "I can't be here, when you go. I'll stay tonight, but I'll go before everything starts." Her face was apologetic as she looked at him. "I suck at goodbyes."

"It's okay." His free hand came up to tuck a stray bit of hair back behind her ear. "Amanda, if... if somethin' happens, you'll look after my mom? I told her the same night I told you an' she... didn't take it so well."

She bit her lip, and nodded. "Of course." Her grip on his hand tightened, although she didn't say anything else. She knew as well as he did that 'something' was entirely likely to happen.

"An'... well, that's pretty much it." He managed a faint rueful smile. "Guess there's nothin' left to do but make the most of tonight."

"The Captain won't be cranky if I don't let you sleep?" she said, in a similar vein.

"Sleep can come later", he answered, and didn't wait for a response before he bent to kiss her.