Scott and Jean, Saturday morning

[x-cyclops.livejournal.com]

Jean gets to point out to Scott that he can't blame the consequences of the morning entirely on the Danger Room having a seizure.


He hurt. It was the first thing that registered when he woke up, and for a moment Scott wondered fuzzily if Nimrod had been by again. Wait, no - he'd been in the Danger Room. And things had gotten a little out of hand. The Danger Room was not supposed to go boom. Wincing, he raised a hand to his forehead, only to twitch as a red-haired shape that was definitely not Jean leaned over him.

"Should I ask you what day it is?" Amelia's familiar voice inquired dryly.

"... no."

"I didn't think so. How many fingers?"

"I have no idea." It wasn't a lie, either. He heard Amelia sigh.

"Well, you're coherent, so that's progress. Stay put - I'll go get Jean. And don't move that leg."

Don't move his leg? What was wrong with his leg? It was his head that felt like it was going to - "Ow!"

"When she says don't move the leg, entertainingly enough, she means don't move the leg. And I also mean don't move the leg. And Moira and Hank and Maddie mean don't move the leg from the far side of the Atlantic. If there were doctors in space who knew you, they would also be behind Amelia when she tells you not to move the leg." Jean figured he had the scolding coming to him, given the scare he'd given her, but when she made it to his bedside her hand was gentle on his forehead, smoothing back his hair. "You're an idiot."

"Oh, shit. Tell me I didn't," he muttered, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment, then opening them and trying to focus on her. It worked, more or less. And unfortunately, the expression she was wearing was all too telling. "I did, didn't I?" She had warned him that if he dislocated that knee again, surgery was a given.

"Got it in one, bright boy." The delayed dilation of his eye as he tried to focus was worrying; definitely a mild concussion to go along with the re-busted knee and all the pretty bruises. "Follow the finger," she said, holding her hand out and moving it slowly about to see how he was tracking as she continued, "So, tell me, what part of running a Danger Room scenario designed for the team's invulnerable trio alongside them without a spotter in the booth sounded like a good idea, o husband of mine?"

"... the Room wasn't supposed to blow up," Scott protested feebly, after a moment. When she put it like that... "It wasn't all that bad a scenario. Or it shouldn't have been. If the damned safeties had stayed on..." The knee was all but screaming in pain at him, even now that he was keeping it carefully immobile. Damn it. "I'm going to make myself a furry blue rug if I find out this was some sort of programming error..."

"I repeat. Spotter. In the. Booth. You're the one who writes the safety protocols, is it really that much to ask that you at least occasionally pretend to follow them." It was possible she was going a bit overboard, but he'd frightened her and then she'd found out WHAT HE WAS DOING. And it's not like Scott pushing himself to prove he could be as good as everybody on their own turf was a new thing, but that didn't mean she had to like it. "I already told Forge what happened, he's probably down there now."

"Well, I suppose I've paid for the stupidity, haven't I?" Thankfully it didn't come out as sharp as it might have; he hurt a little too much to actually snap at Jean. "Sometimes I'm a field leader, and sometimes I'm an object lesson hobbling around on crutches. Seems fair to me."

"Yeah, just wait, you're not going to even get to the crutches for a bit. You get to be an object lesson in bed rest for this one." Jean caught one of his hands in hers and squeezed it tightly. "And personally, I think we check you in to a hospital for the surgery; I'm not bad but a specialist would be better."

"Good thing Charles has a list of doctors who don't freak out at our medical histories, huh?" Inwardly he was flinching at the very idea of bed rest. Fate worse than death... Surely that wouldn't be for too long, though. He usually bounced back pretty fast from just about everything.

The look Jean was giving him said pretty clearly what she thought of that idea, but he still clearly wasn't focusing all that well. Luckily, Jean had no objection to speaking her mind aloud at times, either. "Scott. Surgery. You are not going to push yourself trying to get back on your feet after SURGERY. Because if you do I will break your other leg."

"This is where I say something about passing out to get out of the rest of this conversation," Scott mumbled, more upset than abashed, still. His head was throbbing, if not quite as forcefully as his knee, and Jean was going back out of focus again.

"You do that," Jean said, and all traces of anger vanished from her tone as she leaned over to press a kiss to Scott's head. "Sleep. I promise not to yell at you first thing when you wake up this time."

"No, but you're going to wake me up every hour, aren't you?" he muttered, closing his eyes.

"It's not really a good thing that you know the concussion drill so well..." Jean mused.

"Mmm," was the dour reply.