xp_logs | Crystal and Angelo

Angelo receives a vist from Crystal. Backdated.

Whatever had happened, it must have been big. Big enough to warrant evacuation of the mansion, even though it seemed that what had happened had not taken place at the mansion itself. Big enough to land so many people in the infirmary or confined to bedrest, even if some of those people took "rest" to mean "post silly, drunk-like messages on the journals." As soon as she'd arrived at the mansion and made sure the students who had gone to Muir were settled in, Crystal had dashed off to the infirmary to help, which was where she was now, standing at the bedside of one of the broken and bruised X-Men.

Posting messages, Angelo would have argued, was hardly strenuous and was a good way to pass the time when he wasn't sleeping. However, Kurt's Blackberry had been taken away and returned to its rightful owner, so he had nothing to do but try to sleep. One eye cracked open now and he peered up at Crystal. "...hi."

"Hi. You requested visitors, yes?" She'd already planned on spending quite a lot of time in the infirmary, helping out, and had missed most of that night's journal conversations while on the way back to the mansion, just skimming them quickly before they'd arrived. "I am a visitor."

"I did! Yes, I did." That got a smile. "Are you a visitor just for me, or for everybody?"

"Right now, I am a visitor just for you." Crystal smiled and sat down in a chair next to the bed. "I am assisting in the Medlab and will check on everyone, but it is also important to spend time with people who want visitors."

He nodded carefully, content. "How are you? And the kids who went to Muir..."

How were they? They weren't the ones who had gone off to who-knows-where to return to the school in less than perfect condition. "I should be asking you that, except that it seems to be such a silly question for me to ask. We are all fine. Confused, perhaps, and wondering what happened, but unhurt. Now I suppose I will ask you the same question, silly as it might seem. How are you?

"Good. Unhurt is good. You really don't want to know what happened." He stared at the ceiling for a moment before answering her question. "Alive. Everybody's alive. Which is also good. And gonna get better."

Crystal did actually want to know what happened, or perhaps more accurately, what had happened to necessitate the evacuation of students, residents, and staff from the mansion, but she wasn't about to ask anyone who was even remotely loopy on painkillers to tell her anything of that nature. That wouldn't be fair. So many people were hurt, now wasn't the time to ask anyone questions they might not wish to answer. Instead, she just nodded. "Yes, that is very good." The X-Men seemed to have the amazing ability to return broken, battered, bruised, and exhausted but alive. "I am very glad that everyone returned in one piece."

"Except Kyle", Angelo said placidly, then laughed. "But he'll grow his pieces back. And Marius has extra pieces."

"Except Kyle," Crystal repeated, a frown crossing her face. From the journals, it had been apparent that Kyle and Laurie had not gone home or with other students but had left the mansion with the other trainees. Even then, there was a difference between staying with the people at Snow Valley and going off to become involved in a combat situation. Crystal didn't think she liked either idea, and she found the second one less than appealing.

"Lost some teeth", Angelo told her. "Went up against Toad an' only lost some teeth - kid did well. Saved me an' Clarice."

Somehow, those facts didn't reassure Crystal at all. "I see," she said softly. "Only teeth this time. How fortunate."

"Well, an' the jaw. But that probably healed already." He peered up at Crystal, something in her tone making it through the painkiller haze. "He'll be okay", he tried to reassure her. "An' he wanted to train. He can pull out if he doesn't want to anymore."

Training? Having your teeth knocked out and your jaw broken by a member of the Brotherhood wasn't training, it was getting involved in a dangerous situation in which more than teeth could be harmed or lost. Training was learning about what the X-Men did, honing abilities in skills in a controlled environment, understanding what to do in combat situations... or at least that's what Crystal had thought "training" meant.

It was one thing to happen to run into a Brotherhood member, as she knew had happened to Kyle and other students at the mansion, and an entirely different matter to be sent off to fight one. Or all of them. Knowing absolutely nothing about the mission or why the school had been evacuated, Crystal hadn't the faintest clue as to why the two trainee students had been ordered into a combat zone. Or had they?

"Kyle asked to go fight?" Crystal asked Angelo. "Laurie, too?"

He shook his head. "Wasn't here, remember? Maybe they were just coming to pick us up - there wasn't anybody else. Kyle had soldiers with him."

"Soldiers?" Crystal's eyebrows shot up. "Where exactly did all of this take place, or are you not allowed to tell me that?"

"Tibet", Angelo said, possibly unhelpfully, leaning back against his pillows. "In the mountains."

Tibet. Well then. That was the X-Men, wasn't it? Saving the world, one corner at a time. Questions flooded Crystal's mind, questions not best directed at Angelo, or even directed at anyone else right now. What was done was done, and for the time being, everyone at Xavier's safe. Once again, everyone on the team had managed to return alive, if not quite intact or even whole this time.

"I take it there was no time for sightseeing," Crystal quipped lightly. "Well, like it or not, Mr. Espinosa, I believe that you require rest. Actual rest, not taking-other-people's-phones-to-post-on-the-journals rest. I would suggest reading a book to keep you occupied when you are not resting, but you said your eyes are not working right. How do your eyes and head feel right now?"

"Head's mostly okay", he said after a moment's thought. "Still jars sometimes, but not too much. Eyes are still a li'l bit blurry, but it's gettin' better."

"Try to get some rest, then?" Crystal smiled. "It is late, and you should try to get a full night of sleep. I am sure that you will have more visitors tomorrow, and perhaps we can see about keeping you occupied without taking possession of other people's phones. Do I even want to know how you managed to get Mr. Sefton's phone?"

"He turned his back", Angelo informed her with a satisfied smile. "Phone was in his pocket. It was easy, that close."

"Ah. Sneaky." Crystal stood up. "Rest now, please?"

"Sure", he said, a little less enthusiastically. "I'll rest."

Crystal eyed him skeptically for a moment, knowing full well that Angelo did not want to rest. "I will come back to check on you," she warned him.

That got an innocent grin. "Great. More company. But I'll try to sleep." Or at least pretend to until the pills knocked him out.

She wasn't convinced, but she couldn't make him fall asleep or try to sleep. He was a grown man; she just had to hope that he would choose to rest. "I will see about sending Dr. Voght by to see you before then," Crystal told him cheerfully.

His only response to that was to pull a very expressive face.