xp_logs | Three Deaths A Day [Monet and Nathan]

Monet gets annoyed and goes to have a word with Nathan.

Moira was finally asleep, and Nathan closed the bedroom door behind him, making his unsteady way over to the couch. He had wanted nothing more than to curl up beside her and try to sleep, but he suspected that she would rest better if he wasn't right there. That last vision had shaken her as badly as it had him, and he could feel how unsettled she still was, hours later. She didn't need to be picking up his disturbed thoughts, too.

His chest still hurt, he thought, rubbing absently at it as he sat down. He'd come to to find Moira giving him CPR and the link ablaze with terror. Come to think of it, he wasn't sure which had brought him back.

He was just beginning a meditative exercise, something he hoped would help him relax, when a single, hard knock at came at the door. Nathan blinked, opening his mouth to answer, when the door abruptly opened.

"You!" As a greeting what it lacked in grace it made up for in force. "You!" Monet snapped again, one hand fisted on her designer jean-clad hip, the other pointing at him. He noticed, distantly, that her nails were perfectly shaped, as well as shaking with anger. "Some of us have better things to do than die three times a day, mister!"

All he could do for a moment was gape at her. In the next moment, half a dozen different responses, few of them polite, occured to him. "Keep your voice down," was the one that came out. "Dr MacTaggart's sleeping." Nathan straightened, but stayed where he was on the couch. It was the girl who'd picked him up at the bottom of the stairs that day before Spring Break. Monet, he recalled. "Now what's the problem?" he asked, although from what she'd said, he had a pretty good idea.

Monet's finger continued shaking. "Mostly you," she snarled. "It is you sending all the time." She had managed to lower her voice about an iota. But only a small one. "I'm trying to get better at this shielding thing and people like you dying at me, loudly, does not help." She glared at him, her entire body in an attitude of personal affront. "Could you just quit it? Or turn it down? Or something?"

"Keep your voice down," Nathan repeated, snapping it this time as he sensed Moira start to stir. He reached down the link, nudging her into a deeper sleep, but the effort worsened his headache, which had already been quite bad enough. "You're a telepath?" he asked. Monet gave him a look that very clearly said 'Well, obviously!' in no uncertain terms. "I'm sorry you're picking up my visions," he said, even though part of him wanted nothing more than to slap the girl silly for the attitude she was taking with him. "But there's nothing I can do to stop them. Trust me, I don't want to be dying a couple of times a day either." He tried to inject some humor into the comment, but it seemed to be lost on the girl.

"Why do it, then?" Her anger was abating somewhat, but Monet obviously couldn't understand why anyone would put up with something like that. "It's so," she started again, "distracting, y'know?" Finally calming, she looked at him with curiosity. "It sucks. A lot."

"You don't have to tell me that," Nathan said with a sigh. "Look, why don't you sit down?" Monet did, if grudging - as if she was doing him a favor - and Nathan relaxed back against the couch, massaging his temples. Fuck, his head hut. "I wouldn't wish these damned visions on anyone, Monet, but I don't have any control over them. That's why I'm here -- to get Moira's help with them."

"Obviously she's not doing much good," Monet signed. "Isn't there something else useful you can do?" She looked, for a change, somewhat tired, her anger having faded to a low level crankiness. "I mean, if she's not helping, someone's got to be able to do something and you're only talking to her."

Nathan surprised himself by giving what she'd said serious consideration. About talking to someone else as well, that was, not the remark about Moira. As he'd said to Amanda, he was staring to wonder if he didn't need to bite the bullet and talk to Xavier. The problem seemed to be as much telepathic as precognitive and he supposed it was stupid if one was living in the same house as one of the world's foremost telepaths not to ask said telepath for help.

"You're probably right," he said wearily. "But don't you say that where Moira can hear you."

Monet looked at him for a long moment, thoughtfully. "I think she should know," she said slowly. "Because she's not exactly quiet either. But if you want me to not tell your girlfriend stuff, then fine. But do something about it, and soon. I think it's getting worse, and I need to finish my history assignment."

Nathan stared at her blankely for a moment. "Well," he said finally, for lack of anything better to say. "Wouldn't want my dying to get in the way of your education."

"Everyone keeps telling me that grades are important," Monet agreed, pushing up from the couch and heading to the door.

Nathan stared after her for a long moment, then pulled himself slowly to his feet. Time to go back to bed, he told himself. Before anyone else came knocking at the door.