Madelyn, Haroun - Saturday morning

[x-madelyn.livejournal.com]

Haroun tracks down the cranky doctor after her night of excitement, bearing donuts as warned. It seems he has something on his mind he wants to talk about, and Maddie gets to play cofessor.



Haroun poked his head into Medlab. His skills weren't needed in trying to track the errant Cajun down, and someone had to stay back and keep an eye on the kids. So here Haroun was, with yet another well-stocked bag from the Donut King. It was telling that the clerks there knew him by name, and knew Madelyn's preferences in pastries and coffee better than he did sometimes. Still, she'd had a rough time of it, and he could use someone of the female persuasion to talk to. "Madelyn?" he called out as he entered Medlab. "You in here anywhere?"

"Here," came Maddie's voice from her office, even though the lights were turned down so much it was practically dark. "I got sick of Cecilia fussing over me, so I escaped. You know what they say about doctors, they make lousy patients."

Haroun poked his head into her office, to scout out the lay of the land. "I bring presents and company, if you're so inclined." he said as he waggled the Donut King bag. "Your favorites..."

Maddie looked up from her sprawl on the battered sofa in the corner of her office, well-strewn with cushions for those nights she crashed there. The movement made her wince slightly, and she brought her hand up to her temples. "You are a wonderful man. Want to get married?" she asked, managing a slightly-strained smile.

Haroun grinned. "You tempt me, but I'm going to have to decline. However, we can still have a torrid affair under everyone's nose if you'd like." He handed her the Donut King bag. "Save one of the coffees and a French crueller for me. The rest are yours. And, if you don't mind, I think I'll sit down here for a while. If I look at one more malformed Arabic scripture I am going to shove someone through a log chipper. Ass-first."

"Make yourself at home. Well, as home-y as you can in here - it's not exactly the most comfortable place." With a small grunt, Maddie levered herself upright so she could manage coffee without pouring it down her front. So very attractive, that would be. "I swear, if they hunt down that sonofabitch Le Beau, I'm going to use him for medical experiments," she growled, reaching into the bag for one of the coffees - the shop had put a little smiley face on the lid, to show it was hers - and a donut before passing the bag back to Haroun.

Haroun rescued his coffee and his donut, then passed the bag back to Maddy. "I've been reading his dossier. It's distressingly empty. But if you want to use his guts for garters I won't stop you." He made himself comfortable in her desk chair, then put his boots up on her desk. He looked faintly troubled by something.

Madelyn sipped at her coffee, closing her eyes in appreciation. "God, that's good," she murmured, then looked over at Haroun. "Thank you. You're a marvel, you really are. I've been sitting here stewing over that little shit and popping aspirin, and all you have to do is turn up and I start feeling better." Another sip of coffee, followed by a small nibble at the donut. "You look like a man with something on his mind," she observed, when her mouth was less-full.

Haroun grinned, but then it faded slowly into a more pensive look. "Ahhh, I don't want to bother you. You got choked out by the Cajun, and it's probably just me being stupid anyway." he said with a self-depreciating shrug. "But I am glad that you're feeling a little better."

"I'd like to think it takes more than the Vulcan death-grip from a skinny paranoid to make me neglect my friends," Madelyn told him. "Besides, I need distracting from fantasies of bloody death for him - doesn't do my doctor karma any good. So, if you want to talk, I'm listening."

Haroun took a deep breath and blew it out. "It's Alison." he admitted. "Something's chewing her up, and it's driving me _nuts_. I don't know what it is, and I think I made whatever it is worse."

"You noticed that too, did you?" Madelyn said, leaning back a bit more comfortably against the sofa, legs stretched out along it. She was dressed in ratty old sweat pants and an oversized t-shirt, once dark blue but faded now from many washings. Comfort clothes. "I went the ice cream therapy route after the thing with Cain - have you tried talking to her?"

Haroun sighed. "She's been spending a lot of time with her son." he admitted. "And that's their time, and I'm not going to stick my nose in. I don't know, it's probably just me being stupid. But for some reason this is really getting to me. She's unhappy, and I can't seem to fix it." he said with real frustration. "And the Blackbird's 100% functional right now, so it's not like I can lose myself in repair-work."

"You're not being stupid," Madelyn told him with a tired sigh. She'd been vaguely aware something was up with Alison, but too busy with the Remy thing to do more than that. "Maybe you should take her somewhere, try talking to her - you're her friend, and she trusts you. Better than sitting and stewing, any how."

"That's not the stupid part." Haroun admitted as he sighed again. "Aw, hell with it. You're a friend. I think I've got a Thing for Alison. Not quite sure how to describe it, but I may need that blood filtering soon if it keeps up. She's in my thoughts all the damned time." Haroun looked at Madelyn with some concern. "It sounds so elementary school when I describe it that way."

"Not really. You sound like a man interested in a woman." Madelyn's expression was sympathetic - more than most, she understood the difficulties posed by all this. "And I'd noticed a change in your blood work recently - I was thinking I was going to have to see if you needed to come down." Medical talk as safer ground... Madelyn realised she was doing that, and made herself get back to the point. "I think I know the answer, but have you talked to her about it? The issues involved, how you feel...?"

Haroun shook his head. "Come _on_, there's just no way." he protested. "She sees it as some grand lark. And it's not like I can be what she wants anyway..." he said glumly. "Fuck, now I'm depressing me. But the short-short version is that yeah, I'm interested, and I have _no idea_ how to bring it up to her. It's like she's oblivious, or I really, really need to work on my seduction skills."

"Ali can be particularly dense, sometimes. Especially when it comes to anyone being interested in her." Madelyn personally didn't think Ali saw it completely as a lark - _something_ was bothering her lately, that was for sure. "But she appreciates honesty. I think you'll find that might work in your favour more than all the seduction skills Casanova ever came up with."

Haroun nodded. "OK, OK, I get the message!" he said with a laugh. "I'll try to sit down and talk to her before she turns me into a complete drooling idiot. So - what do you think? This a brother has a chance with the songbird?" he asked with a grin.

"After seeing you two at the dance, I'd say so, possibly more so than most," she said, answering his grin. She wrapped her hands around her coffee cup, warming them - the medlab was always slightly chilly. Her smile turned teasing. "Ours must remain a forbidden love then, I suppose..." she said with a dramatic sigh.

Haroun just had to smirk at that. "Hadn't you heard? The Faithful are permitted more than one wife, assuming that he can support them all equally. So as soon as I get another good-paying job, we can bring our love into the light. Besides, your floorboards are squeaky, and I'm so tired of living a lie." he said with an outrageously flirty grin. He stood up, and then moved over next to Maddy - to take her hands in his own, using a very tiny flare of his power to heat his hands. "Thanks." he said, looking down at her. "For everything."

"Least I could do for my favourite donut slave," she said, the mask of 'coping! see! I'm coping!' slipping just a little at the touch. "Any time, you know that."

"Yes Mistress." he said, doing his best Nineteenth Century Deep South Farm Hand impression. It wasn't very good. "Shit." he said, looking at Maddy's mask slip. "I've upset you, haven't I?"

"Not you. Never you." She tried to get her head back into the Happy Place, and failed miserably. "Crap day," she settled for, with a shrug. "Getting ambushed by someone I was trying to help does that to me."

Haroun hrmmed. "Well, that's good." he said, giving her hands an extra squeeze before retreating back to her desk. "You know, if you want I can help you brush up on your hand-to-hand skills the next time we work out." he said slowly. "If you want."

"I'd like that." Madelyn brushed her hair back with both hands, getting it out of her face before grabbing her coffee again. "It's frustrating, you know? My instructors at the Academy would be chewing me out on the carpet for getting so damn sloppy. I reacted as a doctor, didn't even consider he was a security risk, even when I knew something had happened with him and the Sefton girl."

"And when it comes to Le Beau, he's a security risk with legs. I trust the Professor and respect his judgement, but I think we all misplayed this one. Badly." he said, running his hand over his bare scalp. "But we don't have the manpower to devote someone to watching Remy 24/7 and still cover the rest of our responsibilities."

"Well, water under the bridge now. Nothing to do but damage control. Again." There was a hint of anger in Madelyn's tone, anger and frustration. "You ever wonder if we're actually achieving anything here, Haroun? Sometimes it seems all we do is chase our tails, mopping up after yet another disaster that should have been avoided.

"The alternative is probably much worse." Haroun said slowly. "I believe that we're doing some good out there. Give these kids a place where they can be teenaged anklebiters with everything that implies, rather than corpses burned at the stake or beaten to death for being purple."

"True. Instead they get kidnapped by Norse gods and beaten up by fellow students for no reason at all." Madelyn pulled a face. "Shit, I don't mean that. I'm just angry, and tired, and my head hurts like a motherfucker." She gave Haroun an apologetic look. "Sorry. You don't need my crap. Just seems like the coping skills aren't as effective as they used to be lately. Long summer shaping up to be a longer fall."

"A certain amount of conflict's good for them. Builds character." he said firmly. "But let me just say that Charles has a very different style of keeping order than I do."

"Conflict? Uh-huh. I'm all for a bit of theraputic arguing, maybe some survivalist drills in the woods like Logan used to do, but I think we're a bit beyond that, don't you think? If it isn't our resident witch blasting people into the woodwork, it's kids turning out to be Mafia or Yakuza or assassins and Christ knows what else." Madelyn rubbed her throbbing temples. "Argh."

"Survivalist drills. What a _wonderful_ idea!" said Haroun. "I'll have to talk to Professor Xavier, see if he's willing to restart those. I know that the little rotters have the energy to spare, but we'll have to make sure that they don't treat it like a weekend lark."

"Yeah, we can schedule it between disasters, should go down real well." Madelyn reached for the bottle of aspirin on the arm of the sofa and took a couple, washing them down with coffee and pulling a face as she did.

"Seriously. I know things tend to go to Hell around here - something literally. But it's a good idea and it's worth doing." he said stubbornly. "And if I should happen to get teamed up with the songbird for a few days out in the woods, well, bully for me." he said with a grin. "Could even make it a no-powers thing for the extra pain-in-the-ass factor."

"Sorry. Did I mention the cranky?" Madelyn set her coffee back down, stretched out on the sofa again. "Actually, it is a good idea, and I think it'd be good for the kids - get them out, relying on each other without powers, maybe help sort out some of the lessor feuds that have cropped up..." She closed her eyes, willing the headache away. "Ow."

Haroun stood back up. "Here, sit down here." he said, pointing at the floor in front of the couch. "You're all tense, and you're still recovering from being choked out. Let me help?" he asked her.

Reluctantly - since she'd only just lay down, and now she had to get back up again? - Madelyn sat up and half-rolled off the sofa, grabbing a couple of cushions, one to sit on and one to lean against. "Careful on the neck, it's still bruised," she pointed out, pulling her hair into a rough ponytail and securing it with one of the hair ties she tended to keep on her wrist.

Haroun nodded. "I've got a good grip, so holler if this hurts too badly." Offering a quick prayer of forgiveness to Allah, he laid hands on Madelyn. His skill as a maseusse could be measured more in the enthusiastic beginner category, but he did manage to find most of the tense spots and make a good go at massaging them out.

It hurt, but in a good way. Madelyn's shoulders tended to be on the tense side on a good day, but today you could have broken rocks on them. And while Haroun wasn't trained at all, he was a fighter and knew the difference between tense muscle and relaxed muscle. She whimpered just a little as he worked out the knots in her shoulders, carefully avoiding the faint shadows of bruising higher up on her neck. It was like she was melting into a puddle of goo, she reflected, slumping slightly as Haroun worked. "I'm seriously considering this marriage thing," she told him, eyes closed.

"And I told you, it's going to have to just be a torrid affair." Haroun smirked down at Madelyn as she turned into goo. "I take it that helped?" he asked her, giving her space to reclaim her spot on the sofa - and to reclaim her dignity, if she chose to do so.

"Hmm-mmm," Madelyn replied somewhat incoherently. Dignity be damned. Eventually she dragged herself back onto the couch, propping her cushions on the arm rest and laying her head against it, a blissful expression on her face. "I'm something of a massage junkie," she told him sleepily. "Love 'em, don't get 'em that much, turn into big Maddie-shaped blob of goo when I do."

Haroun couldn't help but grin at that. "I'll keep that in mind. They don't do much for me unfortunately - I'm a little structurally weird, so my muscles have been rerouted all over the place." he said by way of explanation.

"Poor Haroun, misses out on the best things..." Madelyn said. She was about to add something else, but it turned into a random stream of gibberish ending in a slight snore.

Haroun looked at Madelyn. "Apparently." he said sadly, before going hunting for a blanket to drape over her.