jean grey (phoenix). (ex_rises922) wrote in mutanthaven, @ 2009-10-01 22:47:00 |
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JEAN: Scott was situated the couch in Warren's office on the main floor. Before, there had been a small crowd of people in and out of the office. Despite being unable to even accidentally read their minds, a crowded room was like a crowded brain. She needed them out of there so she could think clearly and focus on the injured. Now, it was just Scott and Jean. She organized her supplies on the coffee table before she started her basic examination, running through the points of one from her class in her head. It was a good thing Jean was a good student and not in the habit of depending on her power to earn good grades -- she worked hard and knew her material anyway. She immediately noticed the burns on his hands. She frowned as she arranged his hands carefully until she could dress them. It'd be difficult to admit someone like Scott to a hospital without somehow addressing his -- his eyes? She had made it to his head to check if he had hit his head on anything after getting shocked when she noticed he was curiously wearing a staple of his appearance. She had been more concerned about any injury he incurred earlier to notice that it was odd that he was still wearing his sunglasses. In the four years she had known Scott, she remembered his eyes being wrapped up, closed, or behind those ruby shades. She had gotten used to he sight and didn't think twice about it. Despite his fall, the shades were on straight, which Jean surmised it had been Emma who must have fixed them when they got him situated on the couch. She hesitated before she gently removed his sunglasses, folding in their arms and set them on the end table. Jean sat gingerly on the edge of the couch next to him and, after opening an extra bandage across her thighs, she pulled one of his injured hands into her lap. Palm up, she carefully rubbed it with the disinfectant before applying a small layer of antibiotic. Hopefully this would be enough to prevent it from getting worse -- if it got infected, he'd need medical attention. When she was satisfied with the job she had done, she began to carefully wrap it an one of the bandages.
SCOTT: Scott had no idea how long he'd been out for. He remembered going down to Forge's workshop, followed by Alex, to find the inhibitor so that it could be taken out of the hotel. Why it was still in the hotel in the first place was beyond him, but he didn't have time to argue with Tessa about what a ludicrous judgment call that had been. Then again, his own judgment was about to be proven faulty, although in his defense he had said that he was going to be taking it -- he'd assumed that if something insane was going to happen with it, then someone would have mentioned it. But, it wasn't as though Scott had ever had the best luck in the world anyway, so why should that be any different? Needless to say, he had been bare-handed when he'd picked the thing up -- and was promptly hit with an electric shock so strong that it had dropped him like a ton of bricks. He remembered a blessedly brief shock of pain, and then nothing. Some vague part of his mind had registered the sounds of people around him at some point, but that had faded back out as well. The next thing that he registered was the sound of someone moving around quietly by him, and something being done to his hands. They hurt, but more than that he was woken by the unexpected touches, which switched his mind from vaguely-understanding to needing-to-move. He sat up with a quick intake of breath, the hand she was treating jerking away from her as his eyes opened -- and then shut just as quickly. Tight. For two reasons, really; for one, after so many years of either being blind or seeing only in red, the color of...well, everything else, was somewhat shocking to the senses. It also meant reason two -- his glasses were off. And that was something that could never happen. His hands went to his shut eyes, as though making sure that way as well that the glasses were, in fact, gone. He could feel the pain in them, and didn't know why it was there, but it was secondary to everything else. "My glasses -- where are they?" He hadn't caught sight of Jean, but knew that someone else was in the room with him, who apparently didn't mean him harm.
JEAN: If she had had her telepathy, she would have had some idea of Scott coming around. Instead, she was startled, sitting perfectly still as he suddenly sat up and drew away his hand. She glanced over at his glasses and it was a few seconds before she realized she was waiting for her telekinesis to bring them over. Since everyone's powers had stopped functioning at the hotel, her telepathy was the most noticeably gone. She used her telekinesis for every day things but today wasn't an ordinary day. She didn't have time to do her hair and make-up, or get her bag together for her lecture, or try and pick up around her suite -- all these activities were made easier with telekinesis. Feeling foolish -- both for removing Scott's sense of security even if his powers didn't work and then expecting her own to operate normally when she tried to return his glasses to him -- she leaned forward and grabbed them, so that she could offer them to Scott but not quite yet. "Right here, Scott -- don't worry. You don't need them but what you do need is for me to look at your hands. You burned them. I want to go ahead and get them wrapped up before they could possibly get infected." Jean explained quietly, regaining her composure. She couldn't use her telepathy to comfort him or figure out what was going on with him and it was frustrating. She itched to just grab Scott's hands and pull them back away from his eyes so she could finish her work. She reached out and gently touched his wrists. Come on.
SCOTT: The sound of Jean's voice was reassuring, but surprising in an almost uncomfortable way. Had their powers been there, he would have felt her sooner, surely. Expecting that, and then hearing her out loud instead was unexpected. He frowned, his head turning just a bit on instinct, angling his ear more toward her to hear better, despite her being close already. What she was saying made sense -- their powers were still off, so he didn't need his glasses. She needed to see what was wrong with his hands that was making them hurt so badly. And yet, he couldn't trust it. Scott wasn't a person who could give in to trust easily, even with those that he cared for the most, and despite wanting to, his mind still wouldn't let him. As much as it made sense that he could open his eyes right now if he wanted to, he just...couldn't. That struggle was clear on his face, fighting with himself, trying to tell himself to just listen to Jean and open his eyes. It only lasted for a moment or two though before something there closed off. His eyes were staying shut. He pulled back from the touch at his wrists as well, but only for a moment. Instinct, again. This time, though, he won the fight between logic and impulse, and after that half-second he relaxed a bit and did offer his hands back out. Hoping, really, that he would feel her giving him his glasses, although he knew that it would hurt to have to use his hands to put them back on. In his head, he could hear himself asking for them again, but the words couldn't make their way to his mouth. "..What happened?" He remembered going into the workshop, and then waking up here.
JEAN: She watched him carefully, trying to glean any of his thoughts from his expression. It was painful to not be able to understand what he was thinking. He was hard enough to understand without telepathy and Jean had to often ease situations in which Scott said the wrong thing or whatever he said had been taken the wrong way. It was different knowing what he meant versus what he said and right now, trying to tell what he was feeling by the look on his face was nearly impossible. She sighed, taking the hand with which she was nearly done and secured its bandages. Once she was done, she gently placed his sunglasses in that hand. "You and Alex went down to Forge's workshop to get that inhibitor so you could take it away from the hotel and got electrocuted. It knocked you out pretty good." She went about disinfecting the burns on the other hand before applying antibiotic. "Alex called for help and a few people brought you hear so I could take a look at you. And if you want any sense of privacy, I suggest we keep our voices down -- Logan's outside the door." He might not have his superhuman hearing, but Jean wasn't sure how closely he'd pay attention considering his constant presence that day.
SCOTT: He held still while she finished dressing his hand, and a brief surge of relief went through him when he felt the familiar weight and shape of his wrap-arounds in his hand. He opened them using only that hand (albeit slightly clumsily due to the injuries on it), and set them back on his face. Some of the tension left him at that, even more when he finally opened his eyes and saw his normal, red world back in place. It was strange, how something so small and seemingly insignificant as a pair of sunglasses could provide so much security for a person like Scott Summers. Not even physical security, although that was obviously their main purpose. But the emotional and mental feelings of safeness were not unlike a child with their favorite blanket that they insisted on having everywhere. He studied her face for a moment, before his eyes glanced down to his hands. He didn't realize how disconcerting the glasses must be for a telepath without their powers; the lenses were more or less a two-way mirror -- he could see through them, obviously, but people on the other side couldn't see his eyes through them. Just their own red reflection. The comment about Logan made him quirk an eyebrow and glance in that direction. Unsurprisingly, it was not at all difficult to picture the mountain man with one ear pressed against the door, trying to hear....whatever it was that he thought Scott might say to Jean that would be unacceptable. As usual, any retorts that he might have been thinking about re: Logan didn't make it out. Instead, he looked back to Jean, moving on from that topic without saying a word on it. "Thank you, for this. Your hands.." He trailed off, not sure how to finish that sentence. They were...soft. They felt good, not at all the rougher type of bandaging that he'd expect from most people (himself included). He couldn't think of a way to say that without sounding weird though, and he didn't want to start feeling flustered already in this conversation. He gave a slight shake of his head. Keep it professional, Summers. "Has anyone found a way to remove the inhibitor?"
JEAN: For the first time since this whole debacle started, Jean was regretting the silence in her head. She was left with her own thoughts and, since she couldn't tell what he was feeling through supernatural means, she was left to her own devices. That was never a good thing; Jean could over analyze many things, including (no, especially) social situations. She can read books and deduce their meaning. Without her telepathy, she wasn't sure she could read someone like Scott. Jean herself wore her heart on her sleeve. It was difficult for her to keep her feelings in. Like right now. Her jaw had steeled and she concentrated on putting the top back on the antibiotic. "I don't know -- I wasn't really concerned about the inhibitor," she said, setting the tube down a little more forcibly than she intended when she was getting the dressing for the other hand. She opened her mouth to say something else, but she doesn't even know where to start. She didn't even know why she was starting to get upset over it; she tried to reason with herself but it boiled down to a general frustration at the situation -- and Scott himself. She tried to be accommodating to his needs (such as the burns and the glasses) but he didn't seem to be reciprocating that same courtesy. Maybe this was how people felt when they assumed Scott was being less than pleasant (even if he managed a thanks before asking about that damn inhibitor). Maybe Jean was just tired and the slight nausea that swept over her was not doing wonders for her mood.
SCOTT: Scott had the opposite problem. He may have analyzed things to death when it came to courses of action and ways in which to keep others safe, but when it came to interpersonal relations? He was on the short bus. He didn't pick up on the emotional signals of others easily, and when he did, he didn't know the correct reactions to give very often, unless it was the reaction he was wanting to give in the first place. It wasn't that he was autistic, he'd just...not really had much practice as far as that was concerned, and part of closing himself off from others included closing himself off from reading others. Eyes glanced over to where she'd set the bottle down hard, before looking back to her. He was an idiot, but it had honestly not occurred to him that she might have been worried, or still be worried about him. For Scott, his safety and what had happened to him was secondary to getting something dangerous out of the hotel. "...I'm sorry." He didn't apologize often because he didn't often think that he was wrong for whatever it was that he was doing. But he did regret upsetting Jean. "...So everyone's powers are still off?" Obviously, Jean had not only told him that but she wasn't using her own, but still. He needed to hear it again. He was starting to feel that strong urge to take his glasses off, and he apparently couldn't do that without additional reassurance.
JEAN: At any other time, his secondary concern for himself would have been admirable and at least understandable as she could have sensed his reasoning more than just have to deduce it from a few sentences. But right now, the issue with the inhibitor seemed insignificant to Jean -- or at least, not immediate -- when they were both in this office. She finished with his hand, gently nudging it back to him as she set aside the materials that could now be returned to Hank's lab. She looked back at him. "Yes, everyone's powers are still off. Whatever you guys managed to do with the inhibitor didn't change that," she explained, assuming he wanted more information on the inhibitor. Despite the nice zap it gave Scott, it was not enough to render it useless or damaged. She sat up straight to face him, running her hands down her thighs to her knees now that she was done with Hank's supplies.
SCOTT: Scott pulled his hands back, lifting them a bit so that he could study them and their bandaging now that it was finished. He flexed his fingers a bit, and felt the resounding pain shooting through his palms and up his forearms. It was going to hurt for awhile, of that he was certain. Others might have been demanding pain medication at that point, just to be able to function with that, but Scott had an extremely high tolerance when it came to pain. He also had an extremely low tolerance when it came to asking others for help. And then there was always the fact that he had his own stash of pills back at the other hotel which would make all of this hurting fade away easily. He could just wait until he got back there to take another. The 'you guys' sparked a sudden concern in him, heightened by the fact that he was also realizing he hadn't yet asked about it; for once, even his tone of voice reflected that. "Is Alex okay?" To say that he and his younger brother had a strange and dysfunctional relationship would be kind. Scott was all too aware that he and the other Summers didn't really fit together the way one would expect siblings too, and that there was an emotional chasm between them the size of the Grand Canyon. He knew, too, that it was pretty much his own fault entirely that things were that way, even if he didn't seem to be doing anything to rectify the situation. But he did care. Even if he didn't show it, he cared about Alex, and he wanted him safe. If Alex had gotten hurt because of him, he'd never forgive himself.
JEAN: Luckily for Scott, he didn't have to ask for Jean's help. She gave it without his permission, whether he liked it or not. She was also aware of the difficulties between the brothers for which Scott was sometimes inadvertently responsible -- and sometimes not. She remembered when she first heard about Scott's brother, outside a motel when they hadn't quite made it to California and Warren was asleep in the room. It would be a couple years before she would actually would hear more about Alex and eventually meet him. And Jean took an immediate liking to him and offered to help Alex when it came to the art of understanding Scott. She even looked forward to talking to Alex about UCLA. She wanted so desperately for Scott and Alex to get along and felt sympathetic towards both brothers. "He's fine..." she assured him, placing a hand on his leg. She couldn't be mentally comforting but she could easily be physically comforting. Jean was a naturally affectionate person and that would one day extend to her patients who would be fortunate to experience her bedside manner. But for now, the recipients of her warmth would be her friends and other hotel residents. They really didn't get a say in the manner. "At least, he didn't say anything was wrong with him. I think he was more concerned about you." Jean felt the need to clarify that she gleaned this from what was said and what she experienced, not what she could sense from Alex when the people rushed to Forge's workshop to help Scott. So Jean couldn't tell Scott for sure that Alex was okay, but the impression was he was compared to Scott.
SCOTT: That hand was comforting. Jean's instincts were right there, even if Scott wasn't visibly giving her cues to respond in that manner. Either she knew him well enough subconsciously to not need those right now, or she was just lucky and picked a gesture that he would respond well to, but it worked. He relaxed at the touch, head tilting down a bit to look at her hand for a moment or two, before looking back up to her. He knew his genes, the Summers way of dealing with things, and Alex not mentioning anything wrong with him didn't really mean anything in that sense. They were self-sacrificing to a massive fault, and Scott had no doubt that Alex would say he was alright just so that Scott would get help, meanwhile dying himself in the other room. Still...something in him trusted that touch from Jean. If it were most anyone else, he would likely insist on finding Alex right then to check, but with Jean he did the opposite. He relaxed some. "He shouldn't." Scott didn't know what to do with people who worried about him. Something about others caring for him to that degree was almost unsettling. It was easier to be alone -- or at least, it was something he was far more used to. He looked down to the hand again, thinking for a moment; his head raised slowly after that, and his hand moved up to his glasses. It wasn't easy, his hands hurt extremely badly, but it moved anyway, hesitating at the glasses before slowly starting to pull them off. He hesitated a few times for minuscule moments as he went, but they did come off, slowly but surely. His eyes blinked hard when the real light hit them, when the colors all came at him at once. They watered a bit from it, but not much, and after another second those erratically-blinking brown eyes looked to her, settling on her face. They were just glasses, but he felt more exposed without them than he would if he'd had to strip completely naked. He wasn't used to people getting to really look at his eyes.
JEAN: If Scott was uncomfortable with people caring for him, heaven forbid he ever find out about the people that rushed to his side when Alex called for help. "Well too bad, because he..." she trailed off as she watched him, realizing what he was doing. She held her breath for a moment, thinking if she said anything or made any sound, it would stop him. She kept her hand where it was, not wanting to shy away from Scott now when he was struggling with whether to take his glasses off or not. She would be supportive of (and okay with) whatever made him comfortable -- even if she wanted to see him relax enough to take advantage of the rare opportunity. She didn't want him to regret not doing this when he had the chance. They were already working on a solution to the powerless issue -- when else would the circumstances be right? He was in a safe place, tucked away from the public, and with someone who had known him for years. Maybe he would have felt more at ease if he were by himself, which Jean opened her mouth to offer that option, when he pulled his glasses off his face. When he looked at her, her eyes deliberately moving from one of his to the other. Her faint smile grew larger after a moment. "Hi," she whispered.
SCOTT: Scott would have been mortified to find out about that, thank you. Not to mention he wouldn't have believed that more than maybe two people would care in general, let alone be worried. His eyes were on her hair first, holding there a moment. He knew that she had red hair. He had seen it before, both years ago when he didn't have to stay blind all the time and through her telepathy which had given him eyes of a sort at times. But it had been a long time since the last time that had happened, and something about it was still surprising. Maybe it was that her hair was the same shade without glasses as it was from behind them. He liked that. That even if he could only see her from behind those ruby lenses, he was still seeing something real about her instead of something imposed on her by his disability. Her word pulled his attention though, light brown eyes moving to hers. It probably would have been more dramatic if they were some insane color since they could practically never be seen, and yet. Caramel streaked through chocolate, surprisingly warm given how cold Scott himself could be. Jean's smile was reflected on Scott's own face, his lips pulling up at the edges without his meaning for them to. He couldn't really help it. It was stupid, but it felt so good to just have this moment, inconsequential as it might have been. Other worries fell away for the time being. "Hi." His hand moved up on impulse, fingers touching a piece of her hair. "Your hair -- it's the same with my glasses." Fingers dropped away, not meaning to be imposing by the gesture but unable to help himself at first.
JEAN: The absence of his glasses removed the stoic profile for which Scott could be known, the profile to which Jean had grown accustomed over the years. While the specially-crafted sunglasses kept Scott from accidentally hurting people but also prevented those people from getting close to Scott. For anyone who wasn't a telepath (it seemed), not being able to see his eyes perpetuated his reputation for... robotic. Seeing his eyes, however, made Jean simultaneously relax and tense up: she was able to take cues from Scott's expressions but still desperately wanted to know what he was thinking, what he was feeling. Having his attention on her made her anxious since she didn't know how else to live up to this brief important moment. Should she say something? Should she encourage him to enjoy it while it lasts? Should she just sit here and let him look at her? It took Jean a moment to reply to his comment about her hair, her tongue having tied as she felt the heat rising in her cheeks. Looking down and away, her hand moving to tuck the lock of hair he touched behind her ear. It was a reflexive, nervous gesture rather than a repulsed one. She was acutely aware of Scott's proximity and wondered if Logan was still at the door, waiting. "Hopefully the rest of me isn't disappointing?" She spoke up, a small laugh punctuating the lame joke. Yeah, she was definitely blushing. Who knew if it was because of Scott's attention or the fact that she been holed up in the hotel for too long of a period? She didn't dare move from the couch, though.
SCOTT: Scott had, actually, forgotten all about Logan lurking like a creeper at the door. If he'd remembered, he likely wouldn't have said anything about her hair, or his glasses, or...anything, really. He wasn't a big fan of Logan in general, and definitely not a fan of the idea of Logan sharing in his more private moments. But the overwhelming sense of what was happening here was enough to shove all thoughts of the hairy Canadian out of his mind. An honest smile hit his lips at her reaction and, perhaps more surprisingly, went to his eyes as well. Maybe that was why his smiles always seemed somewhat cold or off when his glasses were on -- his eyes were surprisingly expressive when it came to things like that, to changes like a smile or a laugh, perhaps moreso than the rest of his face was. The smile turned into a quiet laugh when she spoke -- yes, Logan-at-the-door, Scott is laughing -- and he shook his head. "You could never disappoint me, Jean." It was said almost off-handedly, and purely platonically, but he meant it. Scott had known Jean for years now, and she was possibly the only person he knew who had yet to let him down. He was far too much of a cynic to believe that she was perfect, persay, but he had strong doubts that she could disappoint him, especially in an arena so inconsequential as looks. Then again, he was hitting it with Emma Frost, so while he might claim looks didn't matter, his track record seemed to be establishing otherwise. "Plus I know what you look like." His tone was almost teasing. It was just the coloring that was hard to predict. Eyes in particular were difficult to decipher iris-wise, unless they were very dark brown. Which was likely why he kept staring at hers, focused on them intently. If there was one thing that Scott Summers could do uncannily well, it was be intensely focused. He seemed aware of it though, at least, something in his gaze lightening a bit as he glanced to the side for a brief moment. "Sorry, I don't mean to stare." It was just hard not to.
JEAN: She was two seconds from getting sentimental on him until he continued speaking. "...Hey!" Jean had to physically give his shoulder a shove for that one, rather than the telekinetic one he would get when he was teasing her. She wasn't sure if he was trying to make fun of her for her looks or the fact that he obviously knew what she looked like. Not to say that she didn't enjoy the teasing -- she liked Scott's sense of humor. Yes people, he had one. It might not be obvious or even present in the company of other people, but it was there. It was subtle, it was unexpected, and it made Jean feel a little special that she probably got to see it more than most. His teasing lightened the mood and caused Jean to relax, the tension in her shoulders melting and her tongue untied. It helped her not shy away from his gaze but seeing it almost as a challenge. Her expression softened when he looked away. "It's all right... you're allowed, I guess." She tried to keep up the teasing. She could hardly fault him for wanting to take advantage of the situation, as initially unnerving as it could be to her. She wanted him to enjoy this moment, not feel guilty for staring.
SCOTT: The shove to his shoulder got another laugh. Only Jean. While it was more than true that some part of him felt comfortable around her because she was a telepath and could tell what he meant, rather than just going by what he said, there was something more to it as well. Something just about her that made him relax, feel more comfortable, more...himself. When she spoke again, his eyes glanced back up, to the middle of her face, and then to her eyes again. He knew that she was keeping things light, but he was distracted from continuing that by simply looking at her again. "..Alright." If she was okay with it, then he'd keep looking. Despite the innate weirdness of the situation, of sitting there staring into someone else's eyes on purpose for a prolonged period of time, he felt...sort of comfortable, like this, with her. He was going to miss this when his powers came back.