xp_logs | Doug and Angelo, then Doug and Paige, then Paige and Angelo

Backdated to Thursday afternoon, since Angelo's going to be well enough to have visitors after today.

Doug came down the stairs to the basement two at a time and moved quickly down the hall to the Medlab, a bit of a skip in his step. Carrying a medium-sized plastic bag in one hand, he pushed open the door to Doctor McCoy's office with the other, a grin on his face. "Doc, you in here?" he asked.

The blue-furred doctor glanced up from a large medical text and smiled. "Ah, if it isn't everyone's favorite multitalented multilingual mutated monsieur. How fare you, Douglas?"

Doug grinned at Hank's windiness. "Passably well, my favorite verbose azure-tinted Hippocratic friend. Got a minute? I have an idea I want to run by you."

Hank cleared a stool of its collection of printouts and medical texts and gestured expansively. "Sit, Douglas, sit. What can I do for you?"

Doug set his bag on the table and folded his hands. "Well, Angelo is awake, but still not well enough to have visitors, right?"

Hank took his spectacles off and cleaned them with a corner of his lab coat. Placing the glasses back on his nose, he gazed at Doug. "Your surmise would be correct, Douglas. The paranormal efforts of young Miss Sefton aside, Angelo is still recovering from the severe burns that cover much of his body. As much as I understand the rest of his compatriots are concerned for him, and recognizing that their presence would undoubtedly lift his spirits, I cannot in good conscience allow him to have visitors until his recovery is farther along."

Doug smiled. "That's okay, Doc, I understand. I was thinking about it earlier today, and I may have come up with something. There's a fairly large window in the isolation unit, yes?" At Doctor McCoy's nod, Doug pulled a pair of small dry-erase whiteboards with accompanying markers out of the bag. "This is what I came up with. It's unwieldy, certainly, but I think it would certainly help Angelo, as well as the rest of us."

Doctor McCoy whistled through his teeth. "Stars and garters, Douglas, this is quite an ingenious solution. My commendations. I shall take one of these to young Mister Espinosa posthaste, if you'd care to position yourself on the other side of yon window." He clapped a furry hand to Doug's shoulder and moved quickly into the dividing door to the isolation unit.

Entering the unit, Doctor McCoy smiled at Angelo, one hand holding the board behind his back. "How are you feeling, Angelo?"

Angelo looked up at him. "Bored. Can I see people yet?"

Hank shook his head sadly. "Unfortunately, the risk for infection is too high, and I'm afraid it would be inadvisable. But one of your classmates has come up with a rather interesting solution to the difficulty that presents for you and everyone who wishes to see you." Producing the whiteboard, he placed it gently in Angelo's lap. "I believe your benefactor is making his way to the window now to greet you.

Indeed, at that moment, Doug skidded to a halt on the other side of the window, grinning. Catching his breath, he wrote quickly on his board and placed it on the window. "Hey."

Angelo looked up sharply, clutching the whiteboard in his hands. Seeing Doug, he grinned broadly, and hastily scribbled a return greeting on his own board. "Hey yourself. Was this your idea?"

Doug's grin widened in response to Angelo's. Wiping his first message away with a corner of his sleeve, he wrote a slightly longer message. "Yeah. Been racking my brain. You like?"
Avariel Wings: Angelo responded, "I like a LOT. Been so bored in here - can't wait for Amanda to show up again and make it so I can see people. But this is good for now."

Doug nodded. He remembered how bored _he_ had been when he'd been in the Medlab after his beating. And he hadn't had to deal with not being able to have visitors, just a concussion and bruises. "Know what you mean, man. And yeah, that healing thing Amanda can do sounds like a godsend."

Angelo nodded enthusiastically on the other side of the glass. "It is. I'd still have been out cold if it weren't for her."

Doug smiled. "Well, as nice as this is, I really came up with this idea so someone else could use it. I'm gonna go find her, okay?"

Angelo blinked. "Sure..."

Doug grinned and took off at a run down the hallway, board clenched in one hand.

-----

Doug skidded to a halt at the door to Paige's room, grin still plastered to his face. Full of excitement and excess energy, he tapped one foot quickly as he knocked at the door and waited for Paige to answer. He kept the dry-erase board behind his back as a bit of a surprise.

Paige was kind enough to the poor boy to open the door promptly, no matter how many times she told herself that she was no longer opening her door. Her eyebrows went up slightly in surprise, a little smile flickering on her features. "Hi there, Doug."

Doug smiled in response. "Paige! How are you? Gotten five chapters ahead in the texts yet?" His good mood was positively infectious. "I have a surprise for you. Wanna guess what it is?" He kept his hands behind his back as he entered the room.

Blinking at the run-on words that Doug was spewing giddily Paige couldn't help but smile a bit. It was very different being on this side of the perkiness. "Doug. I'm fine. Seven. Do you? A book? In that order."

Doug grinned and wriggled his shoulders. "Good. Seven? Wow. Yes, I do. And no, it's not. Any other guesses?"

"Hm... well, I was thinking either a book or perhaps a mug of tea but from the way you're bouncing about perhaps you've found the elixer of life or the lost ark or perhaps the blueprints of the mansion that show secret tunnels into all of the girl's rooms," Paige replied, grinning to herself.

Doug blinked. "Wait. There are secret tunnels into the girls' rooms? Sweet! I mean..." He shook his head. "Okay, you stink at guessing. So I guess I'll just have to tell you. So, you know how Angelo's awake, but he's not well enough for visitors yet until Amanda does a bit more work on him?"

Paige had a very amused look on her face at this point. "Yes, very aware of that fact."

Doug nodded, slightly sobered at the reminder of just how badly Angelo had been injured. "So anyways, we all have been really concerned and want to see him and let him know how we all care about him and want him better soon. And I came up with something." Whipping out the dry-erase board, he said "Ta-da!"

Paige was laughing even before he had finished, what with the bounciness that was rolling off him. "Doug, you little genius you."

Doug basked in a grinning mockery of a modest blush. "I do try. Would you care to make book on who has the other one?"

"Oh! Oh!" Paige cried teasingly. "I know! Angelo!"

In a parody of a loud game-show host voice, Doug cried out "You're absolutely right! Bob, tell the lovely lady what she's won!" Altering his voice but not the cheese factor, he continued "Well, Chuck, the lovely Ms. Guthrie has won herself an all-expenses-paid trip to the Xavier's medlab, where she and her paramour will share a private conversation via the dry-erase boards she and he are both currently in posession of!"

Giggling, Paige stole the white-board, thwacking Doug on the shoulder with it. "Brat. Amusing brat, though. So it's okay. And very sweet."

Doug smiled happily. "I'm glad you like it. I just...wanted to do something to help. I was kinda worried you'd think it was stupid, and I was really worried that Doctor McCoy wouldn't go for it. But he did, and you don't, so everything is good."

"Large amounts of good. Very, very large amounts. Great even. Super great!" Paige grinned, clutching the board to her chest. "Very super great excellent cubed! I don't know, I'm running out of positives here."

Doug nodded. "I think I got the idea. So, go, get you hence. To the Medlab, away!" He made shooing motions.

"Kay. Going!" Paige said, giggling some more and taking off for the stairs at a blind run. She paused at the door and turned around, waving. "Thanks!"

-----

Paige flew down the medlab stairs, taking them about five at a time at this point. She had the dry-erase board close to her chest as she ran - it was the position that created the least wind resistance and yes she did think about wind resistance at times like this - and had quite the time sliding around the corners in her socks. In fact, she nearly slid straight into the door of the room Angelo was staying in, only preventing it with a little yelp and an outstretch of her arms.

Angelo looked up at the noise, grinning wryly when he saw her. Picking up his own whiteboard, he scribbled simply, "Hey."

Paige waved, trying to balance the board on her knee as she stood on one foot to write. It was quite the feat. Eventually she got out, "Hi! How are you?"

Angelo grinned at her happiness, before answering, "Better. *Much* less bored now I've got this."

"Poor thing," she wrote, holding herself up with her knee this time. "Wish I'd thought of it myself. What can I say, Doug is a genius."

"Yes, he is", Angelo replied. "Get him something from me?"

Paige laughed as she scribbled. "He'll be getting two things then. I'm somewhat thankful myself, you know."

Angelo laughed in turn. "Something for Amanda, too. I owe her big-time."

There was suddenly a tall stool behind Paige and the glimpse of blue fur around the corner but Paige was much too concentrated on writing and climbing up to sit to hunt down that train of thought. She would thank McCoy later with much hugging and offering of Hostess cakes. "Okay, okay! You'd better help think of the gifts, though."

"Of course I will", he wrote, showing it to her with a grin. "Even if I'm not that good at that."

"My idea of gifts when it's not a birthday or Christmas is baking. While I'm sure my mother would be proud it's not like we don't have three fabulous chefs in the building already." She showed it to him and then erased to continue. "Really, I think they put super metabolism drugs in the water. I can't think of another reason why we're all not rolling around."

Angelo nodded. "Well, I don't think Amanda or Doug'd turn down food."

"Probably not. They're sweet like that. Well. Doug is. Amanda is just all about the 'Hey you're my roomie we might as well not stab each other let's stab Clarice instead!'," Paige wrote back, grinning.

Angelo looked confused. "What'd Clarice do?"

Paige shifted on her stool. "She thought it would be fun to glitterfy our room. There was /pink/! And plaid! And sparkles! But mostly, there was /pink/!"

Angelo blinked, then burst out laughing. "She glitterfied you and Amanda?
Why?"

"Just the room. She thought I wasn't sparkly enough. Stop laughing or I'll put it in your room for when you get back!" Paige tried to pout, but there was an obvious grin behind her eyes.

Angelo managed to stop laughing, but couldn't quite hide a grin. "I think Shinobi'd have something to say about that."

Paige scoffed and made a wild gesture with her pen hand. "I could take him."

Angelo chuckled. "Sure you could."

"I could! That had better not be your doubtful handwriting." Paige glared.

That set Angelo off laughing again. "Doubtful handwriting??? Please don't make me laugh, I'm still sore."

Paige gave him a sympathetic smile, but couldn't think of anything to write back to that, nothing that wouldn't sound worried. It took her long moments and all she could come up with was, "Sorry."

Angelo just looked at her through the glass, worried himself now. "Hey - quit that. No guilt allowed."

"Okay." Paige smiled at him, wishing really hard she could be close enough to push that piece of hair away from his face. "No guilt allowed zone. All gone. I'll make a sign to post by your door later."

Angelo managed a faint smile, not convinced by her show of "no guilt". "You do that."

"I will," she wrote, turning her smile into a grin. "It will be neon coloured and hideous."

Angelo pulled a face. "Does it have to be?"

Paige stuck out her tongue at him. "It promotes lack of guilt."

Angelo laughed softly again. "Well, okay then." He hesitated before erasing the last words and writing, "Can you tell me what happened? Dr. McCoy seems not to want to."

There was a flash of something like pain that went through her eyes. Pain in it's much purer form. Paige thought she was okay, how good at denial she was. Her hands shook a little as she tried to write to him, several times, erasing each attempt. Finally, "Not like this."

Angelo nodded reluctantly, not liking her decision but powerless to do anything about it. He wrote simply, "Okay."

Paige looked away, staring down at the whiteboard in her lap and the shaky black scribbles she'd just made. What could she reply to that?

Angelo ducked his head, ignoring his own "no guilt" rule, then wrote "Are you okay?" and knocked on the window to get her attention, holding up the board.

Snapping out of her private conference with herself Paige nodded. "So long as you are."

Angelo wasn't about to lie to her on something so obvious, so he settled for, "I will be."

"Good." Paige didn't like awkward but she smiled anyway. "You will be."