xp_logs | Angelo and Nathan

Angelo stops in to see Nathan on his way from sitting with Bobby, and they talk a bit.

Angelo left Bobby in a desperately needed and hopefully dreamless sleep, and headed out of his suite and along the corridor. Halfway to his room, he remembered the post he'd seen on Nathan's journal earlier that day, and promptly changed course to head upstairs. Arriving at Moira's room, he knocked tentatively.

From where he was sitting in the armchair skimming 'The Sum of All Fears', Nathan looked up, frowning a little. "Come in?" he called back, grimacing at how tired his voice sounded, still. He had spent much of the afternoon dozing, but he couldn't seem to shake the fatigue. The door opened to reveal Angelo, and Nathan smiled faintly. "Come on in," he said. "Moira's just run down to her lab for a few minutes."

Angelo walked into the room, realising suddenly how tired he was himself, and sat down. "Hey. Just came to see how you were doin'."

Nathan shrugged a little. "Better than yesterday," he said, closing the book and leaving it on his lap. The voices started to whisper a little more loudly, as if there being a new person in the room had piqued their interest, and Nathan winced, tilting his head a little. "You look about as tired as I feel," he said, trying to focus on the here and now.

Angelo shrugged and nodded. "Yeah, I guess so. Been with a friend - he's not havin' a good time right now."

"Sorry to hear that." Nathan let his head sag back against the chair and rubbed at the base of his neck. "Bobby, right?" he asked, remembering some of what he had seen on the journals when he had been on earlier. "Something about the Friends of Humanity..."

Angelo scowled. "Yeah. He's suffered 'cause of them before." He couldn't keep the loathing out of his voice on the word "them".

Nathan flinched at the images Angelo projected as he spoke. "I'm sorry," he said quietly. "Glad he's got friends around to help him." The memory of Manuel's odd apology on the journals came back to him, and he grimaced, more of the pieces coming together.

Angelo noticed the flinch, and forced himself to better control. "Yeah. We try."

"It's hard to keep in mind that there are things going on outside of this place," Nathan said absently, his eyes drifting to the window. "Hell, hard to keep in mind that there's stuff going on outside of my own head today..."

Angelo frowned, and asked carefully, "You okay, man?"

Telling himself to focus, he looked back at Angelo. "No," he said as frankly as he could. "I don't think anyone could call me 'okay' by any stretch of the imagination. But it's not too bad at the moment."

Angelo nodded with a wry smile. "Yeah, I know about that."

Kids, Nathan thought with a flash of weary amusement. But he meant well, so Nathan decided not to point out to Angelo that no, he didn't really know. "Stayed breathing all day, at least," he quipped. "Don't know that I want to call that progress, but hopefully it means I'll get a little bit of a break between the really bad visions."

Angelo nodded. "Dr. MacTaggart worked out any ways to help yet?" he asked quietly.

"Still working," Nathan said dryly. "Apparently I'm a unique case. It's not as much fun as it sounds."

Angelo grimaced in sympathy. "She'll get there", he offered weakly.

"I don't doubt it. Just worried about lasting until then." Nathan managed a laugh at the look Angelo was giving him. "Oh, don't pay too much attention to me. I'm wallowing in pessimism at the moment."

Angelo didn't look any less worried for that. "Nothin' wrong with pessimism, long as you talk to someone about it."

"About what?" Nathan asked, a little more sharply than he intended. The voices were getting a little louder again, the odd scream echoing at the back of his mind, and he tried not to pay attention to the flickering in his peripheral vision. "Talking's good if it's something that talking can resolve, Angelo. Otherwise it's just a waste of time."

Angelo all but glared back. "Maybe it won't resolve the actual issue, but it might just stop it eatin' you up from the inside of your head."

"It can get in line," Nathan snapped.

Angelo shrugged and stood up sharply. "Fine. Just came to see how you were, but I think we've been over that."

Nathan squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, trying to pull himself together. "I'm... sorry," he said mechanically. "Thanks for stopping by, Angelo."

Angelo relented slightly. "I'm sorry too. Just been a stressy day, y'know? An' now I think I'll go hit things." And pretend they're FoH members. Or one FoH member.

"Give whatever it is a few for me, okay?" Nathan said, struggling to inject some semblance of humor into his voice. "I think I'm going to go back to bed."

Angelo nodded. "Will do. Hope you get some actual sleep."

"Me too," Nathan said softly.