Grounding

[Pyro]

After Angie left, the young pyromaniac moved across to set down his now empty coffee mug on the side. He looked down at his arms in amazement. The burned skin that had been stiff and sore following the shower were once again smooth and healthy with the light smattering of hairs that he was used to seeing.

"She's amazing," he commented. "That's one heck of a power." He turned to the bed and sat down on the edge. "How do you feel now?" He put out a hand to stroke her cheek.

"I hated seeing you so badly hurt," he said, his voice soft. "It was all my fault. I should have planned this thing out better."

[mystique]

Mystique looked at her coffee and chuckled to herself. "I suppose that's no longer necessary." Getting up, she crawled onto the bed and laid down. It was no more suggestive a movement than it was haphazard, she seemed for once -almost- an ordinary woman.

Until her golden eyes fixed on him and she smiled slowly.

"She's an interesting girl. Though if you don't find one worthy of you to bring into the fold, I'm going to have to start recruiting -for- you."

She trailed her fingernails down his back, tickling the skin there. "Or do you wish them all to be so young and naive?" There was a half playful tease in her voice.

[Pyro]

He loved to have his back stroked and touched. It had ever been the most sensitive part of him. She could do that all night and he would be the most compliant, obedient man she'd ever known. He didn't respond immediately to her words, but allowed himself a selfish moment of absolute indulgence at her touch. It calmed the snakes in the pit of his stomach, relieved the headache, which was already returning.

"There's got to be some merit in recruiting younger people," he said, easily. "We're the future, after all. None of us remember a world without mutants. And I'm not sure she's as totally naive as she seems. She's...interesting."

He opened his eyes and there was a faint glimmer of irritation in them. "I'm doing the best I can," he said. "To recruit. I'm not some sort of general like Magneto was. I can't stand up and speak publicly to an underground of repressed mutants and draw them to our cause." Indeed, the idea of doing such made him feel sick to the stomach.

[mystique]

"Shhhhh..." she said, smiling as her touch continued up and down his back. "I wasn't finding fault in you."

He was tense, and who could blame him. She wished she could take that away from him for a time. If she had Xavier's powers, wouldn't she have broken her own rule and interfered on John's behalf?

"Look at me..." Talk to me. The way he made her feel was vulnerable, wide open, exposed. Fear began to find itself up the length of her spine, but she tried to shove it away. Exposure wasn't half as awful as fear.

[Pyro]

He swallowed back his irritation and looked up at her as she asked. She could see that he was still closing off a certain part of himself from her, and that she didn't blame. He had not been able to trust anybody for so long. He could feel his mood altering and he was aware that there wasn't much he could really do to stop it.

"That feels fantastic," he said as she worked her magic on his back. She could feel the knots of tension in his shoulders, but then she could also feel him at least trying to relax, even if he was physically incapable of letting himself do so. He was perpetually on his guard, even from her. A creature who understood the two prime drives of life.

Fight - or flight.

She knew that John had called the retreat from Baltimore. He could have let the Brotherhood continue their marauding, but he'd seen the sense in flight. He hadn't been afraid to admit a semi-defeat and yet still saw only error and fault in what he had done. One of his own was dead, and he'd clearly taken that on his shoulders as he did other deaths. Even if that man had been damn creepy.

He closed his eyes, letting Mystique work his tension and willing it to subside.

[mystique]

Mystique pulled the covers over herself, rubbing her eyes.

"You have things on your mind. Don't stay here." The backs of her fingers brushed his arm. "You won't sleep if you do."

"Just come back to me."