Post by Pyro on Jul 19, 2006 17:41:21 GMT -5
John headed back indoors trying to look nonchalant about it, but his stomach was churning. He’d never been particularly good around dead bodies. As a small child, he’d had recurring nightmares about zombies after one of the other kids at the children’s home had teased him about it and some habits died hard.
He got to his office, his feet still bare, his hair still wet and slumped down in his chair. This was slowly starting to become too much for the young man to handle.
Mystique followed after, ignoring the rather dumbstruck looks on the faces around her. She didn't prefer to leave Dead Man out on the beach that way, but he could take care of himself and she wasn't the housemistress of Genosha. Her boots were silent on the floor as she stepped into the office, quietly closing the doors behind her.
She looked at Pyro for a moment, that silent, distant gaze always a tribute to her name. So difficult to read. So hard to believe.
But then she moved his keyboard aside and sat on the desk in front of him, crossing her legs. Her hands fell to either side on the desk, black suit creating a V of pearly fair skin from collar to navel. Her eyes were an unmistakable gold now, refusing to surrender back any longer.
"He's not exactly one of us. He contracts in from time to time, and in exchange we protect him. I suppose it's no different than any of the rest of us. You can expect he won't live or die by our word... being quite dead, he's never really respected the living. But he won't betray you either. Not as long as I am here."
She rested the toe of her boot on his knee and watched him. "Penny for your thoughts." She blinked slowly, unmoving in the cool air of the office.
He didn’t look up into her eyes, so missed the obvious.
Pyro was good at that, sometimes.
“A penny?” he said, then laughed, lightly. “I’m not entirely sure they’re worth that much, really. It’s just…” He leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes, running his hand across his jaw which had a couple of days worth of stubble gracing it. “Sometimes I feel the pressure of all this and I worry that I did the wrong thing.”
A deep sigh.
“And now the numbers are increasing, and people like the – uh – Dead Man, who know everything of old…I’ve only been in the Brotherhood for what, just over eighteen months? What right do I have to assume leadership?”
"What right?" She continued to watch him. His lack of confidence was the only thing holding him back. Such a shame.
"It is neither a right nor a privilege, Pyro. It's a responsibility, a duty." She meant it, a certain intensity in her voice where the building up of his ego stopped, and her expectations for him began.
"You're doing very well so far. Do you think I wouldn't have taken this away from you if I thought you couldn't handle it?" That's where her voice shifted once again, so much like her body once could. The last few words lightened in tone just enough to let him know it was not a threat, but an affirmation. She wanted him here, in charge of the Brotherhood she'd been a part of for so many years.
His eyes opened and he looked directly at her. He was, paradoxically, young and mature at the same time, yet still with the boyishness that had always marked him. She remembered his periodic moments of excited outburst, those moments that detracted from all the effort he put into trying to make people forget just how young he was. She suspected that as with a lot of immature young people, he’d remain that way right through his twenties and even into his thirties.
“I was never the responsible or dutiful one,” he said, thoughtfully, then he laughed, a genuine laugh of warmth. “Boy, Bobby would crease up if he heard you say those two words to me, I can tell you.”
He got to his feet and paced a little.
“I was right to carry on, though, right? It’s what he would have wanted – actually, it’s what I wanted.”
"What you wanted... yes. And that's the important part. What we do here isn't about any individual." She looked down at her knees.
Sometimes, the hot knife of Magneto's betrayal cut deeper than she intended it to. It hadn't been the first time he'd turned on her, but never had it been so completely, and over something so terrible. They'd always played a game of wit and word, and if one of them got left behind in the battle for mutant supremacy, so be it. They both understood that certain sacrifices had to be made.
But he'd LEFT her there. As if they'd never known one another. As if everything between them was erased with one dose of the cure.
Mystique blinked out of her thoughts, fiddling with something under the lapel over her heart. "I know you came to love him, in your way. And you had good reason to. But you must not regret the past." She looked to him.
"We have a future here, Pyro. It's time to embrace it."
“He was probably the closest thing to a father I ever had. Even more than Professor Xavier. He never liked me, I knew that. Magneto told me that Charles Xavier did more for mutants than I’d ever know.” He shook off the memory of what had been among Magneto’s last words to the impetuous boy he had won over to his cause.
John stopped his pacing.
“I believe in everything Magneto ever said, Mystique. I doubted for a while, but…well, I came to realize he was right. Humans and mutants are never really going to manage the side-by-side thing.” He put a hand to his temple. “There’s some painkillers in the top drawer of that desk, could you throw them over? I have a major headache.”
Mystique stood and opened the drawer, nicking them into her hand and stepping over to him. She placed herself too close, slipping a cool hand around his neck. She handed him the little bottle and looked him in the eyes.
"Then you're beginning to understand." She looked back over her shoulder, and picked up the glass of wine still there from last night, handing it to him. "Drink it down. It'll calm your nerves."
He was very, very aware of how close she was and it made him feel both anxious and relaxed at the same time. “I don’t normally drink,” he told her, a little sheepishly. “Don’t handle it so well.” Still, he accepted the drink from her and swallowed it down.
“Probably shouldn’t take the painkillers with alcohol, but hey. Live dangerously, huh?” He looked her straight in the eye and she saw the molten steel of pride that Magneto had seen in him that day on the Blackbird, that look of a young man who carried himself with the knowledge of what he was, not afraid of it, but not fully understanding either.
He remembered last night, remembered kissing her. It would be so easy to do it again now, but he held himself back.
"With a life like ours, who needs drugs." She smiled, running her fingernails lightly into the hair at the back of his head.
She spoke to him gently, as if to say she too wished they didn't have to get back to business, but couldn't delay it. She closed the gap between them and let her body brush his as she spoke.
"Emma Frost has been working with us for a number of years. I'd like her to sit in on the meeting by video conference, if you don't mind. She rarely joins us publicly, preferring to work in the background in order to protect her public identity. But she's vital, if the sentinels are going to show up in Baltimore."
My, but he was a handsome boy. The thought flickered on her eyes, as she distracted herself with his body for a moment.
“I have no problem with that. If she can push money our way, she can dance the fandango on the head of a pin for all I care.” He caught the look in her eyes, but didn’t truly understand it. He’d never seen himself as particularly attractive, never really haven taken much pride in his appearance – until Magneto had told him to smarten himself up.
THEN he’d dyed his hair, dressed carefully. THEN he’d made an effort to look presentable. Because it won him approval. And if there was one thing St. John Allerdyce had craved all his life, it was approval.
Mystique had agreed wholeheartedly, and unfortunately for her clueless leading man, it resulted in this. It wasn't the first time she'd been completely ignored when coming on to someone, but it wasn't common for it to happen when her desire was genuine, and not merely a play for power.
She took a step back, taking the empty glass from him and putting it back on the desk. She sat down in the chair opposite his desk, crossing her legs again and leaning back a bit.
Her golden eyes looked up at the ceiling.
"I'm going to ask that you stand by me in the meeting when I tell them I want to go in first. If they're intelligent, they won't argue the point. They know we're coming, so they'll be expecting me. But I'm confident in spite of that, and with Emma and Dead Man's help, I'll get what I'm after before they can stop me."
“What is it that you’re after, Mystique?”
The question had many, many layers and was surprisingly complex if viewed from a certain angle. John was feeling a serious sense of confusion caused by his conflicting feelings towards the stunningly beautiful woman before him. He moved slightly so he was perching on the edge of the desk. Heis hair had dried now and was almost comically untidy.
“I’ll stand by you. I always did, you know that. If there’s one thing I regret deeply – and I know you said that I shouldn’t dwell on the past, but hear me out here. I regret…I regret not pleading your case in that damn van. I’m harder than that now. I just want you to know that had the choice been mine, I’d have taken you out of there.”
There was a long pause.
“At the very least, I’d have covered you up.”
A woman who hadn't lost everything in that moment would have laughed, or at least cracked a smile at his comment. Instead she just stared at him, inscrutable.
He didn't know just how easy to read he was; the moment she pulled away from him, he'd come after her. Or perhaps he knew the game, as Eric always had, though their game had been far more dangerous and far less... hot.
She'd lived a different life in the last year, taken the time to see how the other half lived. The deathlike stillness of a life without intrigue, cut off from her passions; no gun at her hip, no one to weave lies into. Returning here had been a private sort of triumph. But she was still a changed person. Still not entirely sure on her feet.
"I appreciate that John." She tried not to make the words mean too much, but in the quiet between them it seemed to linger.
She examined her perfect pale pink fingernails, breathing a slow sigh. Honesty. It had always failed her. But wasn't this the best time to try out new things?
"I want the Brotherhood to do it right this time. Eric is frightened. He lost his mind. I-" She cleared her throat. Honest was one thing, confessions were another.
"I want to see you become something better than he was ever able to be." It took her a moment to lift her eyes to his. Sure, there was a lot of the silver-tongued shapeshifter in the statement. But there was a lot of the woman he'd seen in the van there too. "For you. I want that for you. But I also want that for us."
“We’ll do it right, Mystique, I promise you.” Impulsively, he caught her hands. “You and I – we can do this thing. All I ask is that you guide me right. You know, you’re wise.” His grip tightened around hers, something shone deep behind his eyes.
“We’re leaders of the revolution, you and I. We’re gonna take these guys places. We’re gonna hit the heights. We’ve got it. We can do it. Oh, hell, yeah.”
His passion for what he was saying was obvious in his face, evident in his tone, clear in his eyes – and meant that when he did finally kiss her again, the kiss was laced with the fire that gave him his name.
The laughter that bubbled from her just before they kissed was one of pure joy- a feeling she hadn't experienced in years too long to explain to her painfully young counterpart. He had the same determination and drive Magneto possessed, but none of the dark solemnity. But then again, she thought as her arms pulled him tightly to her, maybe the time had come to stop comparing the two.
It had also been a long, long time since she'd wanted to make a meeting of minds wait on the eve of destruction; but as her eyes opened and her fingers traced a criss-cross pattern over his back beneath the fabric of his shirt, she realized she had gotten far more than she bargained for. Or everything she'd hoped. She wasn't quite sure.
She was breathless as she broke the kiss, lips lingering near his as she smiled. "Damn right." There was the sort of light in her eyes that reflected his fire; it said she not only believed in his words, but was renewed by them.
It was with obvious reluctance that he released her and stepped back. “I act on impulse,” he said, softly. “I hope you will forgive me if I made too many assumptions.” And there he was again, the silver-tongued writer stepping to the fore. He’d undergone so many shifts in personality in such a small period of time.
This one was rather suave and in control.
He did not let go of her hand as he opened up to her his deepest worry.
“I have…nightmares,” he said, quietly. “And they’re getting worse. When I was at the Institute, the Professor … well, he did something to me. Put some sort of protection in my head to block the psychic vibrations I was picking up. It helped. It dampened the nightmares down. But since he died…”
John shook his head. “I have headaches all the time,” he said. “And there are other things, too. The way I feel. Some days…there’s huge chunks of my memory…just out of my reach.” He tapped the side of his head.
“Crazy man,” he said, softly. “Bobs always said it, and I think he might be right.”
The smooth leader shifted slightly to give way to the youth. “I think he did more than just block out my nightmares.”
Mystique focused, watching him as he spoke. It wasn't the first time Xavier had put himself where he didn't belong. Few things made her angrier than mutants holding other mutants back.
"It was worse than I thought then..." she almost whispered, straightening his hair a bit in an oddly intimate gesture.
"Your nightmares, you may have to learn to conquer. Your memory... is it connected to anything? Fatigue, or... stress? What moments do you forget, and how do you know you've forgotten them."
Mystique was not entirely convinced Xavier was dead, of course. Nor anyone else that was now gone from them. She'd seen too many dead lovers, rivals, and allies rise from the dead. Thus she rarely dismissed them, thus she never mourned.
But if Xavier's control was wearing off...
“People talk about things as though I should know what happened, as though I was there. Could be a mixture of fatigue and stress.” He gave a charming, lop-sided smile. “I’m in a Catch-22 situation half the time. I can’t sleep because I’m so stressed and I get stressed because I’m so tired. I tried sleeping pills, but they made me sick.”
He considered for a few minutes. “Remember I said my powers were changing? Do you think the headaches and all this … stuff … are connected somehow?”
"It's possible," she said, letting go his hand to straighten her suit and her hair, looking at the door. "Remember your abilities are genetic, they're a part of who you are." She frowned a bit, looking back at him. "But it could be something else, someone trying to get in. You can't be too careful."
"I know this Baltimore endeavor will be stressful for you, but it shouldn't be. We're going to do what we came to do, then leave. If we're smart, and we go there with a single purpose in mind, then it will be in and out." She leaned back against his office door, sliding several fingers into the pocket at her hip.
"It's likely a good idea for you to try and learn to calm yourself. I've seen more than one of us lose control of their powers simply because they were having an argument. Sometimes it's good to lose control," she smirked, the Mystique he knew slipping back into place. "But you'll want to have the choice when the time comes."
Mystique stood, putting a hand on the door and looking him over with an appraising, suggestive expression.
“I’m working on it,” he said, with a rueful smile. “Thanks for the advice.” He ran his fingers through his hair and took a deep breath. The single glass of wine was already affecting him slightly, but the ibuprofen was countering it. The headache was fading.
“I’m going to go and put some boots on,” he said, “then we’ll go do this briefing. And Mystique? I give you my word that whatever you suggest, I’ll back you up.”
He moved to the door, caught her face briefly in one hand and headed back down towards his room.
He got to his office, his feet still bare, his hair still wet and slumped down in his chair. This was slowly starting to become too much for the young man to handle.
Mystique followed after, ignoring the rather dumbstruck looks on the faces around her. She didn't prefer to leave Dead Man out on the beach that way, but he could take care of himself and she wasn't the housemistress of Genosha. Her boots were silent on the floor as she stepped into the office, quietly closing the doors behind her.
She looked at Pyro for a moment, that silent, distant gaze always a tribute to her name. So difficult to read. So hard to believe.
But then she moved his keyboard aside and sat on the desk in front of him, crossing her legs. Her hands fell to either side on the desk, black suit creating a V of pearly fair skin from collar to navel. Her eyes were an unmistakable gold now, refusing to surrender back any longer.
"He's not exactly one of us. He contracts in from time to time, and in exchange we protect him. I suppose it's no different than any of the rest of us. You can expect he won't live or die by our word... being quite dead, he's never really respected the living. But he won't betray you either. Not as long as I am here."
She rested the toe of her boot on his knee and watched him. "Penny for your thoughts." She blinked slowly, unmoving in the cool air of the office.
He didn’t look up into her eyes, so missed the obvious.
Pyro was good at that, sometimes.
“A penny?” he said, then laughed, lightly. “I’m not entirely sure they’re worth that much, really. It’s just…” He leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes, running his hand across his jaw which had a couple of days worth of stubble gracing it. “Sometimes I feel the pressure of all this and I worry that I did the wrong thing.”
A deep sigh.
“And now the numbers are increasing, and people like the – uh – Dead Man, who know everything of old…I’ve only been in the Brotherhood for what, just over eighteen months? What right do I have to assume leadership?”
"What right?" She continued to watch him. His lack of confidence was the only thing holding him back. Such a shame.
"It is neither a right nor a privilege, Pyro. It's a responsibility, a duty." She meant it, a certain intensity in her voice where the building up of his ego stopped, and her expectations for him began.
"You're doing very well so far. Do you think I wouldn't have taken this away from you if I thought you couldn't handle it?" That's where her voice shifted once again, so much like her body once could. The last few words lightened in tone just enough to let him know it was not a threat, but an affirmation. She wanted him here, in charge of the Brotherhood she'd been a part of for so many years.
His eyes opened and he looked directly at her. He was, paradoxically, young and mature at the same time, yet still with the boyishness that had always marked him. She remembered his periodic moments of excited outburst, those moments that detracted from all the effort he put into trying to make people forget just how young he was. She suspected that as with a lot of immature young people, he’d remain that way right through his twenties and even into his thirties.
“I was never the responsible or dutiful one,” he said, thoughtfully, then he laughed, a genuine laugh of warmth. “Boy, Bobby would crease up if he heard you say those two words to me, I can tell you.”
He got to his feet and paced a little.
“I was right to carry on, though, right? It’s what he would have wanted – actually, it’s what I wanted.”
"What you wanted... yes. And that's the important part. What we do here isn't about any individual." She looked down at her knees.
Sometimes, the hot knife of Magneto's betrayal cut deeper than she intended it to. It hadn't been the first time he'd turned on her, but never had it been so completely, and over something so terrible. They'd always played a game of wit and word, and if one of them got left behind in the battle for mutant supremacy, so be it. They both understood that certain sacrifices had to be made.
But he'd LEFT her there. As if they'd never known one another. As if everything between them was erased with one dose of the cure.
Mystique blinked out of her thoughts, fiddling with something under the lapel over her heart. "I know you came to love him, in your way. And you had good reason to. But you must not regret the past." She looked to him.
"We have a future here, Pyro. It's time to embrace it."
“He was probably the closest thing to a father I ever had. Even more than Professor Xavier. He never liked me, I knew that. Magneto told me that Charles Xavier did more for mutants than I’d ever know.” He shook off the memory of what had been among Magneto’s last words to the impetuous boy he had won over to his cause.
John stopped his pacing.
“I believe in everything Magneto ever said, Mystique. I doubted for a while, but…well, I came to realize he was right. Humans and mutants are never really going to manage the side-by-side thing.” He put a hand to his temple. “There’s some painkillers in the top drawer of that desk, could you throw them over? I have a major headache.”
Mystique stood and opened the drawer, nicking them into her hand and stepping over to him. She placed herself too close, slipping a cool hand around his neck. She handed him the little bottle and looked him in the eyes.
"Then you're beginning to understand." She looked back over her shoulder, and picked up the glass of wine still there from last night, handing it to him. "Drink it down. It'll calm your nerves."
He was very, very aware of how close she was and it made him feel both anxious and relaxed at the same time. “I don’t normally drink,” he told her, a little sheepishly. “Don’t handle it so well.” Still, he accepted the drink from her and swallowed it down.
“Probably shouldn’t take the painkillers with alcohol, but hey. Live dangerously, huh?” He looked her straight in the eye and she saw the molten steel of pride that Magneto had seen in him that day on the Blackbird, that look of a young man who carried himself with the knowledge of what he was, not afraid of it, but not fully understanding either.
He remembered last night, remembered kissing her. It would be so easy to do it again now, but he held himself back.
"With a life like ours, who needs drugs." She smiled, running her fingernails lightly into the hair at the back of his head.
She spoke to him gently, as if to say she too wished they didn't have to get back to business, but couldn't delay it. She closed the gap between them and let her body brush his as she spoke.
"Emma Frost has been working with us for a number of years. I'd like her to sit in on the meeting by video conference, if you don't mind. She rarely joins us publicly, preferring to work in the background in order to protect her public identity. But she's vital, if the sentinels are going to show up in Baltimore."
My, but he was a handsome boy. The thought flickered on her eyes, as she distracted herself with his body for a moment.
“I have no problem with that. If she can push money our way, she can dance the fandango on the head of a pin for all I care.” He caught the look in her eyes, but didn’t truly understand it. He’d never seen himself as particularly attractive, never really haven taken much pride in his appearance – until Magneto had told him to smarten himself up.
THEN he’d dyed his hair, dressed carefully. THEN he’d made an effort to look presentable. Because it won him approval. And if there was one thing St. John Allerdyce had craved all his life, it was approval.
Mystique had agreed wholeheartedly, and unfortunately for her clueless leading man, it resulted in this. It wasn't the first time she'd been completely ignored when coming on to someone, but it wasn't common for it to happen when her desire was genuine, and not merely a play for power.
She took a step back, taking the empty glass from him and putting it back on the desk. She sat down in the chair opposite his desk, crossing her legs again and leaning back a bit.
Her golden eyes looked up at the ceiling.
"I'm going to ask that you stand by me in the meeting when I tell them I want to go in first. If they're intelligent, they won't argue the point. They know we're coming, so they'll be expecting me. But I'm confident in spite of that, and with Emma and Dead Man's help, I'll get what I'm after before they can stop me."
“What is it that you’re after, Mystique?”
The question had many, many layers and was surprisingly complex if viewed from a certain angle. John was feeling a serious sense of confusion caused by his conflicting feelings towards the stunningly beautiful woman before him. He moved slightly so he was perching on the edge of the desk. Heis hair had dried now and was almost comically untidy.
“I’ll stand by you. I always did, you know that. If there’s one thing I regret deeply – and I know you said that I shouldn’t dwell on the past, but hear me out here. I regret…I regret not pleading your case in that damn van. I’m harder than that now. I just want you to know that had the choice been mine, I’d have taken you out of there.”
There was a long pause.
“At the very least, I’d have covered you up.”
A woman who hadn't lost everything in that moment would have laughed, or at least cracked a smile at his comment. Instead she just stared at him, inscrutable.
He didn't know just how easy to read he was; the moment she pulled away from him, he'd come after her. Or perhaps he knew the game, as Eric always had, though their game had been far more dangerous and far less... hot.
She'd lived a different life in the last year, taken the time to see how the other half lived. The deathlike stillness of a life without intrigue, cut off from her passions; no gun at her hip, no one to weave lies into. Returning here had been a private sort of triumph. But she was still a changed person. Still not entirely sure on her feet.
"I appreciate that John." She tried not to make the words mean too much, but in the quiet between them it seemed to linger.
She examined her perfect pale pink fingernails, breathing a slow sigh. Honesty. It had always failed her. But wasn't this the best time to try out new things?
"I want the Brotherhood to do it right this time. Eric is frightened. He lost his mind. I-" She cleared her throat. Honest was one thing, confessions were another.
"I want to see you become something better than he was ever able to be." It took her a moment to lift her eyes to his. Sure, there was a lot of the silver-tongued shapeshifter in the statement. But there was a lot of the woman he'd seen in the van there too. "For you. I want that for you. But I also want that for us."
“We’ll do it right, Mystique, I promise you.” Impulsively, he caught her hands. “You and I – we can do this thing. All I ask is that you guide me right. You know, you’re wise.” His grip tightened around hers, something shone deep behind his eyes.
“We’re leaders of the revolution, you and I. We’re gonna take these guys places. We’re gonna hit the heights. We’ve got it. We can do it. Oh, hell, yeah.”
His passion for what he was saying was obvious in his face, evident in his tone, clear in his eyes – and meant that when he did finally kiss her again, the kiss was laced with the fire that gave him his name.
The laughter that bubbled from her just before they kissed was one of pure joy- a feeling she hadn't experienced in years too long to explain to her painfully young counterpart. He had the same determination and drive Magneto possessed, but none of the dark solemnity. But then again, she thought as her arms pulled him tightly to her, maybe the time had come to stop comparing the two.
It had also been a long, long time since she'd wanted to make a meeting of minds wait on the eve of destruction; but as her eyes opened and her fingers traced a criss-cross pattern over his back beneath the fabric of his shirt, she realized she had gotten far more than she bargained for. Or everything she'd hoped. She wasn't quite sure.
She was breathless as she broke the kiss, lips lingering near his as she smiled. "Damn right." There was the sort of light in her eyes that reflected his fire; it said she not only believed in his words, but was renewed by them.
It was with obvious reluctance that he released her and stepped back. “I act on impulse,” he said, softly. “I hope you will forgive me if I made too many assumptions.” And there he was again, the silver-tongued writer stepping to the fore. He’d undergone so many shifts in personality in such a small period of time.
This one was rather suave and in control.
He did not let go of her hand as he opened up to her his deepest worry.
“I have…nightmares,” he said, quietly. “And they’re getting worse. When I was at the Institute, the Professor … well, he did something to me. Put some sort of protection in my head to block the psychic vibrations I was picking up. It helped. It dampened the nightmares down. But since he died…”
John shook his head. “I have headaches all the time,” he said. “And there are other things, too. The way I feel. Some days…there’s huge chunks of my memory…just out of my reach.” He tapped the side of his head.
“Crazy man,” he said, softly. “Bobs always said it, and I think he might be right.”
The smooth leader shifted slightly to give way to the youth. “I think he did more than just block out my nightmares.”
Mystique focused, watching him as he spoke. It wasn't the first time Xavier had put himself where he didn't belong. Few things made her angrier than mutants holding other mutants back.
"It was worse than I thought then..." she almost whispered, straightening his hair a bit in an oddly intimate gesture.
"Your nightmares, you may have to learn to conquer. Your memory... is it connected to anything? Fatigue, or... stress? What moments do you forget, and how do you know you've forgotten them."
Mystique was not entirely convinced Xavier was dead, of course. Nor anyone else that was now gone from them. She'd seen too many dead lovers, rivals, and allies rise from the dead. Thus she rarely dismissed them, thus she never mourned.
But if Xavier's control was wearing off...
“People talk about things as though I should know what happened, as though I was there. Could be a mixture of fatigue and stress.” He gave a charming, lop-sided smile. “I’m in a Catch-22 situation half the time. I can’t sleep because I’m so stressed and I get stressed because I’m so tired. I tried sleeping pills, but they made me sick.”
He considered for a few minutes. “Remember I said my powers were changing? Do you think the headaches and all this … stuff … are connected somehow?”
"It's possible," she said, letting go his hand to straighten her suit and her hair, looking at the door. "Remember your abilities are genetic, they're a part of who you are." She frowned a bit, looking back at him. "But it could be something else, someone trying to get in. You can't be too careful."
"I know this Baltimore endeavor will be stressful for you, but it shouldn't be. We're going to do what we came to do, then leave. If we're smart, and we go there with a single purpose in mind, then it will be in and out." She leaned back against his office door, sliding several fingers into the pocket at her hip.
"It's likely a good idea for you to try and learn to calm yourself. I've seen more than one of us lose control of their powers simply because they were having an argument. Sometimes it's good to lose control," she smirked, the Mystique he knew slipping back into place. "But you'll want to have the choice when the time comes."
Mystique stood, putting a hand on the door and looking him over with an appraising, suggestive expression.
“I’m working on it,” he said, with a rueful smile. “Thanks for the advice.” He ran his fingers through his hair and took a deep breath. The single glass of wine was already affecting him slightly, but the ibuprofen was countering it. The headache was fading.
“I’m going to go and put some boots on,” he said, “then we’ll go do this briefing. And Mystique? I give you my word that whatever you suggest, I’ll back you up.”
He moved to the door, caught her face briefly in one hand and headed back down towards his room.
