Amanda, Nate - Saturday night.
Jul. 3rd, 2004 10:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xp_daytripper posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsWith Nathan still not sleeping properly, Amanda comes by with her nightly sleeping potion. They talk while he drinks it, about the language classes, the thing with Jubilee and Manuel. Then Nate lets what happened at Friday's session with Galin slip and Amanda growls at him before accepting that this doesn't involve her.
It was becoming something of a ritual, the nightly sleep potion run. Amanda tapped on Nate and Moira's door with her free hand, the other occupied by the steaming mug. It wasn't a good thing that Nate needed the potion to seep, but Amanda secretly enjoyed the excuse to talk to him without either of them having a crisis. And the fact she could help without putting either of them at risk. "Oi, Nate, yer drug dealer's here."
Nathan, sitting at the desk reading through the latest set of Arabic exercises, raised an eyebrow, snorting. "Not so loud," he said, reaching out with his telekinesis to open the door. "And what time is it?" He looked around vainly for his watch, which he'd taken off because it was bothering him as he wrote comments. "Are you and Moira plotting to make my bedtime earlier or something?" he asked, giving the young witch a mildly suspicious look.
"'S 'most eleven - 'm runnin' a bit late 'cause I was talkin' t' Beth on the phone," Amanda replied, closing the door behind her with her foot and coming over to set the mug down on a clear patch of desk. It took a moment to find one. "That the Arabic homework? How'd I do?"
"Seventeen out of twenty," Nathan said. "Messed up on a verb in one of the sentences, which sort of skewed the whole thing." He cast the sleep potion a look of loathing as he piled the exercise papers back on top of each other and stuffed them in his folder. Amanda was staring rather intently at the papers as he moved them, and he couldn't help a smirk as he picked up on a stray thought. "And no, I'm not telling you how Jubilee did."
She pouted and gave him a look he was getting to know well. The 'I'm cute and you don't want to make me sad by not letting me have my way' look. The fact its success was patchy at best didn't stop her from trying it on him regularly. "Just tell me who did better?"
"The usual suspects," he said, unable to help a slight grimace as he thought about Paige. "You were up there among the top three, though, if you really want me to satisfy your competitive urge."
Amanda couldn't help a slightly smug grin - Jubilee was not generally one of the 'usual suspects', and that meant she'd beaten the mall rat again. Now to improve on her Mandarin, which was proving slightly more difficult... "Hey, least I've got a competitive urge. It ain't usual with the school work," she said, plonking herself down in one of the armchairs and tucking her legs up underneath her. She was wearing a pair of jeans that had been cut off at the knee and a Ramones tank top - since the pool party, her shirts had began to cover less, and the neckline of this one revealed the first few lines of Rack's binding spell. "Just want t' wipe the smug smile of Lee's face, is all."
"What is it with the two of you?" Nathan asked, giving in to curiosity finally. "You have no idea how close I came to stepping in during that little spat of yours on the journal and suggesting you both channel all that energy into my classes. In the interests of being productive and all..."
Amanda shrugged. "She just gets up me nose, is all. She tried the whole 'this is my turf' thing with me back when I first turned up. An' she thinks she's so tough, which is a fuckin' joke." The girl snorted. "She was homeless in a bloody mall, for Christ's sake. Real hard life, that is. She wouldn't have lasted five minutes in London."
Nathan raised an eyebrow. "I thought you didn't play 'who had the worst childhood'?" he asked patiently, no edge to his voice.
Amanda looked slightly uncomfortable. "I don't," she said, perhaps a little defensively. "She's the one who started it with this whole shite 'bout how hard she'd had it before she got here, an' how she didn't want t' see anyone trashin' the place." Aware of how childish that sounded, she added quickly: "An' then after the whole Limbo thing, she said I weren't a reasonable human bein'. I try t' not let her get at me, but she just... she just hits all me buttons, y'know?"
He was supposed to be staying out of things like this, Nathan reminded himself. "You also forgot that you and Doug aren't the only ones in the house who can read phonetic Askani," he said with a faint smile. "How much of this is about her and Manuel?"
"We didn't get on before she started hangin' 'round Manny like a bad smell," Amanda replied quickly, but under Nate's look, she squirmed and admitted, a blush colouring her cheeks. "Some. Just don't like the idea of 'em gettin' chummy, is all. Samson's pointed out we're not that different, but the bits where we are different, she's bett... she's more Manny's type."
Nathan shook his head, lifting the mug and sipping at it tentatively. "Well, I'm sure as hell not the person to be giving you advice on your relationship," he said, making a mental note to speak to Moira about it, get her advice. The female perspective was liable to be quite different.
"I'm sure as hell not the person t' be in a relationship in the first place," Amanda sighed. "Too fuckin' complicated, if you ask me. It's bloody hypocritical of me too, gettin' all bent out of shape over this. 'S not like I mind when he goes off an' does his thing, any more 'n he minds me doin' it. 'S just... Lee The last word came out almost as a growl. "She thinks she's so damn good, an' she rubs me nose in it."
"Some people would say that we all need a nemesis," Nathan said good-humoredly. "Maybe Jubilee is yours?" He took another careful sip of the potion. "I suppose I should tell you that I'd prefer you try and resolve it, but I'm not feeling that hypocritical tonight."
"Good. 'Cause it ain't gunna happen." Her voice took on a stubborn note. "Ain't nowhere that says I have t' be best mates with everyone in this place, an' as long as we keep out of each other's faces, it works. I'll just have t' put up with the Manny part - she'd probably tell tales if I warned her off, an' I ain't gunna give her the satisfaction of knowin' it pisses me off. Or Manny, for that matter, tho' he probably has an idea with the link an' all. An' I'm gunna beat her in the language classes even if I have t' study til me head explodes. She already thinks I cheated with the Askani, an' I want t' see her face when I get better marks in Mandarin."
Nathan's smile grew a little. "So long as that's the only way in which you want to beat her, I have no issue with that," he teased lightly, sipping at the potion. "There are far worse forms of motivation."
"Threefold rule, remember? I can't touch her, not with the magic, more's the pity. There's this mild hex I used t' use if people crossed me..." Seeing Nate's expression darken, she grinned. "Jokin', really. I've got too much t' lose by goin' after Lee, an' she ain't worth the trouble. An' she's too much of a kid t' handle Manny any way, for all she's older 'n me. Wouldn't know what t' do."
"I think we should stop talking about anyone handling Manuel," Nathan said dryly. "Provokes rather disturbing mental images." Amanda snorted at him, and he shrugged, smiling again and raising the mug. "Already making me loopy," he claimed.
"Can't handle yer potions, you can't," she told him, grinning. "I've never seen 'em work on anyone so well as you. Tho' I think I'm buildin' up a tolerance meself."
"I've decided it's not so bad if I think of it as homeopathic or something," Nathan pronounced. "Not actually a drug..."
"Homily'd be insulted if she heard someone callin' it a drug. Very anti-medicine, she is. Big on the herbs an' the healin' an' all." Amanda chuckled. "She keeps tryin' t' pour cleansin' tonics into Pete whenever they meet up. 'S a right laugh. But she's taught me a lot, an' sends over new potions for me t' try. She seems t' think we're a bloody unhealthy lot over here, tho' I s'pose the state I was in when she met me didn't help." Then, the thought occurring to her, she asked: "Speakin' of unhealthy... I know you can't talk 'bout what goes on in Manny's sessions, but what was with him bein' sick on Friday? nearly lost me lunch meself, havin' that come down the link. An' I had t' give him somethin' for it later."
Nathan's eyes flickered to her, a bit warily. "He didn't tell you anything about what happened?" he asked, and Amanda shook her head. He pursed his lips. "We were trying something, a technique, that didn't sit very well with him," he said finally. "I'm sorry you got caught up in it."
"He doesn't tell me much 'bout what he's doin' 'less he gets it right - doesn't like bein' a failure, as he calls it. An' things've been a bit on the tense side this week, with the Askani. Least we're talkin' again, but with emotions runnin' so high this last couple of weeks, the shieldin's takin' a lot out of him." Before Nathan could get that guilty look again, Amanda gave him a pointed glance. "An' the Askani's my problem, not yers, so don't go beatin' yerself up 'bout it. As for the rest... well, 's part of havin' the link. An' I'm gettin' better at shieldin' meself. Just missed that one."
"I'm sorry to hear he doesn't talk about it," Nathan said with a sigh. "I was hoping he would... he trusts you, and he's discouraged a lot."
"I dunno how t' make him talk t' me," Amanda replied, her expression a little pensive. "When things go well, he's all wantin' t' show me an' test it out, but it bothers him when he doesn't get it. 'Specially since..." She gave Nathan an apologetic grin. "Well, I won't give you details, but we've been havin' a bit of a dry spell - too much bad feelin' in the place lately, an' he can't concentrate t' shield an'... you know, at the same time."
The level of liquid in the mug was starting to get noticeably less. "Explains some things," Nathan said. "The frustration level. Him taking swipes at me..." He stopped, blinking, giving the potion a suspicious look and then Amanda a tentative one. "You didn't hear that."
It was lucky that he'd looked down at the potion first, as he missed the alarmed expression that crossed her face. "Didn't hear nothin'," she said, blandly, her expression apparently unconcerned. "But yeah, he is frustrated. An' he don't deal with it that well. An' he probably weren't too happy with Askani this week, neither." She said it off-handedly, hoping Nathan was feeling the potion's effects enough to keep talking - if she asked directly, he'd just clam up. And this sounded serious.
"I don't know what she did," Nathan muttered. "I was on the floor."
"Floor?" It popped out before she could stop it. "You takin' up yer felled tree impressions again, old man?"
He waved dismissively at her. "I'll have you know I was on the floor for a very good reason," he said. The potion was getting cooler. Easier to drink faster. Which was good, because he was starting to get the idea that this conversation really needed to come to a close fairly soon. "And she apologized," he said abruptly. "Not to him, though... it was all just very excessive."
"Excessive for who? Yer only just gettin' yer head back together after the whole not-sleepin' thing, you shouldn't be endin' up on the floor, whatever the reason." Now the worry was creeping into her voice, and she switched to Askani. "~Neither of you is helped if you are broken in the process, elder brother.~"
Whoops. "It had nothing to do with Manuel," Nathan said, trying to reassure her even as part of him pointed out that he was talking about the session and he wasn't supposed to do that. Not just for the obvious reasons of discretion, either. If he got started talking about it he wouldn't stop, and no one needed to hear him bitch and complain. "Well... the thing with me and the floor, I mean," he corrected himself a bit muzzily. "Not really. He just... I mean, she had to... um. Stuff got out of hand?" Amanda didn't look convinced.
"Right," she said, her voice unimpressed. "'S between the two - or three or four or however many of the Askani're involved - of you, an' none of my beeswax, but fuck, Nate, 's hard t' sit here an' not worry when yer endin' up on the floor an' Manny's throwin' up. An' I thought the magic was rough on a person." She sighed. "'M gettin' a bad feelin' 'bout this."
"I'm not going to let anything happen to him," Nathan said insistently. "I know that I didn't do so well at that this week, but..." Frustration welled up inside him at the doubt in Amanda's eyes. "I don't blame you for not believing me," he said, the words spilling out. "But I won't let her do anything to him again." Friday Manuel had done it to himself, after all. "I told her... she's not allowed. Just hit me if she has to hit me, and let it be..."
"How 'bout there's no hittin' at all? Fuck it, Nate, you don't have t' be anyone's punchin' bag, especially hers. An' just 'cause Manny needs teachin' don't mean he gets t' smack you down neither." Amanda's own frustration came to the fore. "I know him, he's probably takin' digs every chance he gets."
Nathan quite deliberately downed the rest of the potion. "Everything's fine," he said as steadily as he could. "Charles... I'm telling Charles what happens. Progress reports and all. If there was anything really out of line going on he'd step in. You know him."
Point taken - she knew he'd be out of it in no short order now he'd finished the last of the potion, which was her cue to leave. "Fine. Everythin's fine an' I should stop worryin' an' let you lot get on with it," she said, a touch sulkily. It seemed that everyone was telling her to sit back and let things go lately. She uncurled from the chair, came over to collect the empty mug. "Night, Nate."
Nathan reached out as she approached, taking her wrist in a gentle grip as she reached out for the mug. "It's okay," he said, blinking to try and focus on her face. The potion was hitting fast and hard. "It is. Know it's hard, but... it's helping him. Starting to, at least." He managed a smile, shifting his grip a little, squeezing her hand. "Some things are just... beyond you. Even when you want to be a part of it. So I'm doing it... trying to do at least a little like you'd do it. ~In your place and in your honor.~ Trying to do it for him, not just because of them and that damned dream." He sighed, his gaze straying away from her face, fixing blankly on the wall. "Just wish it wasn't this hard."
"You should get t' bed before you fall asleep in the chair," she said, her tone softening a little although the frustration and hurt were still there. But he was right - some things were beyond her, even if she didn't want them to be. "~The hardest paths lead to the best views,~" she added in Askani, the formal words sounding odd coming from her. "I trust you Nate, t' do yer best by him. Just don't forget yerself while yer actin' in me place, all right? I couldn't stand it if somethin' happened 'cause of that." She squeezed his hand back. "Now, bed. Or I'll have t' float you, an' yer too bloody big."
Nathan pushed himself up out of the chair, managing to keep his balance. "You've my very favorite drug dealer," he said with a lopsided smile, blinking rather blearily down at her. "You know that, right?"
"I bet you say that to all the mutant witches," she said, chuckling.
It was becoming something of a ritual, the nightly sleep potion run. Amanda tapped on Nate and Moira's door with her free hand, the other occupied by the steaming mug. It wasn't a good thing that Nate needed the potion to seep, but Amanda secretly enjoyed the excuse to talk to him without either of them having a crisis. And the fact she could help without putting either of them at risk. "Oi, Nate, yer drug dealer's here."
Nathan, sitting at the desk reading through the latest set of Arabic exercises, raised an eyebrow, snorting. "Not so loud," he said, reaching out with his telekinesis to open the door. "And what time is it?" He looked around vainly for his watch, which he'd taken off because it was bothering him as he wrote comments. "Are you and Moira plotting to make my bedtime earlier or something?" he asked, giving the young witch a mildly suspicious look.
"'S 'most eleven - 'm runnin' a bit late 'cause I was talkin' t' Beth on the phone," Amanda replied, closing the door behind her with her foot and coming over to set the mug down on a clear patch of desk. It took a moment to find one. "That the Arabic homework? How'd I do?"
"Seventeen out of twenty," Nathan said. "Messed up on a verb in one of the sentences, which sort of skewed the whole thing." He cast the sleep potion a look of loathing as he piled the exercise papers back on top of each other and stuffed them in his folder. Amanda was staring rather intently at the papers as he moved them, and he couldn't help a smirk as he picked up on a stray thought. "And no, I'm not telling you how Jubilee did."
She pouted and gave him a look he was getting to know well. The 'I'm cute and you don't want to make me sad by not letting me have my way' look. The fact its success was patchy at best didn't stop her from trying it on him regularly. "Just tell me who did better?"
"The usual suspects," he said, unable to help a slight grimace as he thought about Paige. "You were up there among the top three, though, if you really want me to satisfy your competitive urge."
Amanda couldn't help a slightly smug grin - Jubilee was not generally one of the 'usual suspects', and that meant she'd beaten the mall rat again. Now to improve on her Mandarin, which was proving slightly more difficult... "Hey, least I've got a competitive urge. It ain't usual with the school work," she said, plonking herself down in one of the armchairs and tucking her legs up underneath her. She was wearing a pair of jeans that had been cut off at the knee and a Ramones tank top - since the pool party, her shirts had began to cover less, and the neckline of this one revealed the first few lines of Rack's binding spell. "Just want t' wipe the smug smile of Lee's face, is all."
"What is it with the two of you?" Nathan asked, giving in to curiosity finally. "You have no idea how close I came to stepping in during that little spat of yours on the journal and suggesting you both channel all that energy into my classes. In the interests of being productive and all..."
Amanda shrugged. "She just gets up me nose, is all. She tried the whole 'this is my turf' thing with me back when I first turned up. An' she thinks she's so tough, which is a fuckin' joke." The girl snorted. "She was homeless in a bloody mall, for Christ's sake. Real hard life, that is. She wouldn't have lasted five minutes in London."
Nathan raised an eyebrow. "I thought you didn't play 'who had the worst childhood'?" he asked patiently, no edge to his voice.
Amanda looked slightly uncomfortable. "I don't," she said, perhaps a little defensively. "She's the one who started it with this whole shite 'bout how hard she'd had it before she got here, an' how she didn't want t' see anyone trashin' the place." Aware of how childish that sounded, she added quickly: "An' then after the whole Limbo thing, she said I weren't a reasonable human bein'. I try t' not let her get at me, but she just... she just hits all me buttons, y'know?"
He was supposed to be staying out of things like this, Nathan reminded himself. "You also forgot that you and Doug aren't the only ones in the house who can read phonetic Askani," he said with a faint smile. "How much of this is about her and Manuel?"
"We didn't get on before she started hangin' 'round Manny like a bad smell," Amanda replied quickly, but under Nate's look, she squirmed and admitted, a blush colouring her cheeks. "Some. Just don't like the idea of 'em gettin' chummy, is all. Samson's pointed out we're not that different, but the bits where we are different, she's bett... she's more Manny's type."
Nathan shook his head, lifting the mug and sipping at it tentatively. "Well, I'm sure as hell not the person to be giving you advice on your relationship," he said, making a mental note to speak to Moira about it, get her advice. The female perspective was liable to be quite different.
"I'm sure as hell not the person t' be in a relationship in the first place," Amanda sighed. "Too fuckin' complicated, if you ask me. It's bloody hypocritical of me too, gettin' all bent out of shape over this. 'S not like I mind when he goes off an' does his thing, any more 'n he minds me doin' it. 'S just... Lee The last word came out almost as a growl. "She thinks she's so damn good, an' she rubs me nose in it."
"Some people would say that we all need a nemesis," Nathan said good-humoredly. "Maybe Jubilee is yours?" He took another careful sip of the potion. "I suppose I should tell you that I'd prefer you try and resolve it, but I'm not feeling that hypocritical tonight."
"Good. 'Cause it ain't gunna happen." Her voice took on a stubborn note. "Ain't nowhere that says I have t' be best mates with everyone in this place, an' as long as we keep out of each other's faces, it works. I'll just have t' put up with the Manny part - she'd probably tell tales if I warned her off, an' I ain't gunna give her the satisfaction of knowin' it pisses me off. Or Manny, for that matter, tho' he probably has an idea with the link an' all. An' I'm gunna beat her in the language classes even if I have t' study til me head explodes. She already thinks I cheated with the Askani, an' I want t' see her face when I get better marks in Mandarin."
Nathan's smile grew a little. "So long as that's the only way in which you want to beat her, I have no issue with that," he teased lightly, sipping at the potion. "There are far worse forms of motivation."
"Threefold rule, remember? I can't touch her, not with the magic, more's the pity. There's this mild hex I used t' use if people crossed me..." Seeing Nate's expression darken, she grinned. "Jokin', really. I've got too much t' lose by goin' after Lee, an' she ain't worth the trouble. An' she's too much of a kid t' handle Manny any way, for all she's older 'n me. Wouldn't know what t' do."
"I think we should stop talking about anyone handling Manuel," Nathan said dryly. "Provokes rather disturbing mental images." Amanda snorted at him, and he shrugged, smiling again and raising the mug. "Already making me loopy," he claimed.
"Can't handle yer potions, you can't," she told him, grinning. "I've never seen 'em work on anyone so well as you. Tho' I think I'm buildin' up a tolerance meself."
"I've decided it's not so bad if I think of it as homeopathic or something," Nathan pronounced. "Not actually a drug..."
"Homily'd be insulted if she heard someone callin' it a drug. Very anti-medicine, she is. Big on the herbs an' the healin' an' all." Amanda chuckled. "She keeps tryin' t' pour cleansin' tonics into Pete whenever they meet up. 'S a right laugh. But she's taught me a lot, an' sends over new potions for me t' try. She seems t' think we're a bloody unhealthy lot over here, tho' I s'pose the state I was in when she met me didn't help." Then, the thought occurring to her, she asked: "Speakin' of unhealthy... I know you can't talk 'bout what goes on in Manny's sessions, but what was with him bein' sick on Friday? nearly lost me lunch meself, havin' that come down the link. An' I had t' give him somethin' for it later."
Nathan's eyes flickered to her, a bit warily. "He didn't tell you anything about what happened?" he asked, and Amanda shook her head. He pursed his lips. "We were trying something, a technique, that didn't sit very well with him," he said finally. "I'm sorry you got caught up in it."
"He doesn't tell me much 'bout what he's doin' 'less he gets it right - doesn't like bein' a failure, as he calls it. An' things've been a bit on the tense side this week, with the Askani. Least we're talkin' again, but with emotions runnin' so high this last couple of weeks, the shieldin's takin' a lot out of him." Before Nathan could get that guilty look again, Amanda gave him a pointed glance. "An' the Askani's my problem, not yers, so don't go beatin' yerself up 'bout it. As for the rest... well, 's part of havin' the link. An' I'm gettin' better at shieldin' meself. Just missed that one."
"I'm sorry to hear he doesn't talk about it," Nathan said with a sigh. "I was hoping he would... he trusts you, and he's discouraged a lot."
"I dunno how t' make him talk t' me," Amanda replied, her expression a little pensive. "When things go well, he's all wantin' t' show me an' test it out, but it bothers him when he doesn't get it. 'Specially since..." She gave Nathan an apologetic grin. "Well, I won't give you details, but we've been havin' a bit of a dry spell - too much bad feelin' in the place lately, an' he can't concentrate t' shield an'... you know, at the same time."
The level of liquid in the mug was starting to get noticeably less. "Explains some things," Nathan said. "The frustration level. Him taking swipes at me..." He stopped, blinking, giving the potion a suspicious look and then Amanda a tentative one. "You didn't hear that."
It was lucky that he'd looked down at the potion first, as he missed the alarmed expression that crossed her face. "Didn't hear nothin'," she said, blandly, her expression apparently unconcerned. "But yeah, he is frustrated. An' he don't deal with it that well. An' he probably weren't too happy with Askani this week, neither." She said it off-handedly, hoping Nathan was feeling the potion's effects enough to keep talking - if she asked directly, he'd just clam up. And this sounded serious.
"I don't know what she did," Nathan muttered. "I was on the floor."
"Floor?" It popped out before she could stop it. "You takin' up yer felled tree impressions again, old man?"
He waved dismissively at her. "I'll have you know I was on the floor for a very good reason," he said. The potion was getting cooler. Easier to drink faster. Which was good, because he was starting to get the idea that this conversation really needed to come to a close fairly soon. "And she apologized," he said abruptly. "Not to him, though... it was all just very excessive."
"Excessive for who? Yer only just gettin' yer head back together after the whole not-sleepin' thing, you shouldn't be endin' up on the floor, whatever the reason." Now the worry was creeping into her voice, and she switched to Askani. "~Neither of you is helped if you are broken in the process, elder brother.~"
Whoops. "It had nothing to do with Manuel," Nathan said, trying to reassure her even as part of him pointed out that he was talking about the session and he wasn't supposed to do that. Not just for the obvious reasons of discretion, either. If he got started talking about it he wouldn't stop, and no one needed to hear him bitch and complain. "Well... the thing with me and the floor, I mean," he corrected himself a bit muzzily. "Not really. He just... I mean, she had to... um. Stuff got out of hand?" Amanda didn't look convinced.
"Right," she said, her voice unimpressed. "'S between the two - or three or four or however many of the Askani're involved - of you, an' none of my beeswax, but fuck, Nate, 's hard t' sit here an' not worry when yer endin' up on the floor an' Manny's throwin' up. An' I thought the magic was rough on a person." She sighed. "'M gettin' a bad feelin' 'bout this."
"I'm not going to let anything happen to him," Nathan said insistently. "I know that I didn't do so well at that this week, but..." Frustration welled up inside him at the doubt in Amanda's eyes. "I don't blame you for not believing me," he said, the words spilling out. "But I won't let her do anything to him again." Friday Manuel had done it to himself, after all. "I told her... she's not allowed. Just hit me if she has to hit me, and let it be..."
"How 'bout there's no hittin' at all? Fuck it, Nate, you don't have t' be anyone's punchin' bag, especially hers. An' just 'cause Manny needs teachin' don't mean he gets t' smack you down neither." Amanda's own frustration came to the fore. "I know him, he's probably takin' digs every chance he gets."
Nathan quite deliberately downed the rest of the potion. "Everything's fine," he said as steadily as he could. "Charles... I'm telling Charles what happens. Progress reports and all. If there was anything really out of line going on he'd step in. You know him."
Point taken - she knew he'd be out of it in no short order now he'd finished the last of the potion, which was her cue to leave. "Fine. Everythin's fine an' I should stop worryin' an' let you lot get on with it," she said, a touch sulkily. It seemed that everyone was telling her to sit back and let things go lately. She uncurled from the chair, came over to collect the empty mug. "Night, Nate."
Nathan reached out as she approached, taking her wrist in a gentle grip as she reached out for the mug. "It's okay," he said, blinking to try and focus on her face. The potion was hitting fast and hard. "It is. Know it's hard, but... it's helping him. Starting to, at least." He managed a smile, shifting his grip a little, squeezing her hand. "Some things are just... beyond you. Even when you want to be a part of it. So I'm doing it... trying to do at least a little like you'd do it. ~In your place and in your honor.~ Trying to do it for him, not just because of them and that damned dream." He sighed, his gaze straying away from her face, fixing blankly on the wall. "Just wish it wasn't this hard."
"You should get t' bed before you fall asleep in the chair," she said, her tone softening a little although the frustration and hurt were still there. But he was right - some things were beyond her, even if she didn't want them to be. "~The hardest paths lead to the best views,~" she added in Askani, the formal words sounding odd coming from her. "I trust you Nate, t' do yer best by him. Just don't forget yerself while yer actin' in me place, all right? I couldn't stand it if somethin' happened 'cause of that." She squeezed his hand back. "Now, bed. Or I'll have t' float you, an' yer too bloody big."
Nathan pushed himself up out of the chair, managing to keep his balance. "You've my very favorite drug dealer," he said with a lopsided smile, blinking rather blearily down at her. "You know that, right?"
"I bet you say that to all the mutant witches," she said, chuckling.
