xp_logs | Cain and Angelo, a couple of weeks ago

They fix the pipes damaged by Lorna during Bobby's ice-water prank, and talk.

Angelo made his way along to Alison and Lorna's old room, as he'd arranged with Cain, ready to start working on the broken pipes. Arriving at the suite and hearing metal clattering inside, he opened the door and stepped through.

Cain looked up at Angelo as he entered, a quick look of surprise flashing across his broad features. He hadn't actually expected the young man to show up. Gesturing to a pair of gloves sitting atop a stack of pipe sections, Cain grunted at Angelo. "Go ahead and start handing me those one-and-a-half inch pipes. We get a good rhythm going here, we ought to be finished by lunch."

Angelo noticed the look of surprise, but chose to ignore it. He was well aware of what Cain thought of him, and saw no point in bringing it up before he had to. He nodded, put on the gloves and picked up the first pipe to hand to Cain, standing ready with the next one for when it was wanted.

Cain cinched down the pipe, turning the joint to where it'd carry the hot water up to the showerheads. After putting in the emergency backflow valves in case of anyone else deciding to freeze the pipes, or flush some contraband down the toilet most likely, Cain was feeling rather impatient, and it was taking every ounce of control he had not to instinctively snap at Angelo.

Angelo, picking up on the tension, was watching him warily, and took care to have each section of pipe ready and waiting for when Cain wanted it, not wanting to set the older man off if he could avoid it.

After nearly an hour of working in silence, Cain cinched down the last pipe fitting and knelt down, checking the seals. "So," he asked with the first words spoken in the room for a while, "which one of the teachers put you up to being a good little helper all of a sudden?"

Angelo blinked, then answered honestly. "Marie, in a way. But not like that. It's just... a deal we made."

With a shrug, Cain nodded. "Well, that's reassuring. If you'd tried to feed me some bullshit about really wanting to help, I'd have to start suspecting mind control." He reached over for the floorboards, each marked with a chalk number to indicate their position on the floor. As he began assembling them like a puzzle, Cain indicated for Angelo to do the same.

Angelo nodded and started putting the boards in place, careful to get each one in the right position, following what Cain was doing.

After another long stretch of silence, Cain finally relented and spoke. "Okay, you mean well, I get it. I may not always - okay, ever - agree with some of the ways you go about stuff, but you're trying to do what's right by this place." Cain leaned back against the wall, pulling the gloves off his hands. "I probably don't know the least bit about where you came from - and frankly, I don't care. But both Slim and Miss D'Ancato tell me you've put yourself in harm's way for these people more than once. That's worth something."

Angelo nodded, a little uncomfortably, pulling his gloves off in turn. He'd never liked attention being drawn to his "Gryffindor tendencies" as Paige called them. "I do what I can."

Cain paused and pointed at Angelo, his eyes glaring. "And that's where you're wrong. Shit, you've wound up in that infirmary god knows how many times because you keep trying to do what you CAN'T." Marko ran a hand through his hair in frustration. "You want to stand up for your friends, and the first thing that comes into your mind is to teach them to shoot a gun? Man, do you even THINK?" Cain gave up trying to set his ire aside and just began to vent. "You mean well, but look how many times meaning well puts you in a hospital bed. You may think there's a need to stand and fight, but what happens when someone else tries to do it, someone like Artie, or Ramsey, or someone who doesn't have a clue what they're doing?"

Angelo moved instinctively to put his back against the wall, and replied as calmly as he could. "Already happened, long before the raid, long before I said anythin' about havin' to stand an' fight. Doug - or rather, Artie who happened to be with Doug - ran into some trouble in the mall, Doug managed to get him safe away, but he couldn't do the same for himself. He was out cold for nearly a week 'cause I didn't get there in time. An' you always pick out the gun thing, but that was only part of what I was offerin', like I told you before. A part I was more than ready to drop, once I wasn't so mad at the whole thing. Dropped the whole thing, in the end, anyway."

Noticing Angelo's subtle show of defensiveness, Cain resisted the urge to smile. "And you want to go after the guys that hurt them, or that raided the place, or that hassled you and Marie, huh? Hell, I can understand that." Cain nodded. "But there's a time and a place for fighting, and a time and place for getting your ass out of there, you know?" He tapped his own head, reminding Angelo of his time in the infirmary all bandaged up. "Sooner you figure that out, the longer we can keep that bed down in the medlab empty."

Angelo nodded, head bent. "God knows I wouldn't say no to that. An' I'm tryin' to learn... which is which."

Cain cocked a finger at Angelo, cowboy-style. "And that, grasshopper, ain't a bad place to start. Now, hand me that pipe cinch and we'll be just about done here."