The car was a literally a piece of crap, but he was in heaven.

It was a 1976 442 that was rusted over, had no working lights, and had a questionable odour, but the engine ran well, so who was he to complain?  It would make a good summer project for himself, and anyone else, if they so chose.  That being said, he was almost guaranteed to just work on it himself, but he'd promised Ada he'd try to find himself a hobby, something to occupy his time.

This would work.

He had just finished looking the car over, detailing in his head all the things he needed to do, when something caught his eye.  A woman, he'd never seen before, opening the door to what he believed to be Matty's car.

"Hey!," he called out, heading towards the car. "What are you doing? That's not your car."

Okay so he lied.

He'd told her he'd be there first thing in the morning, but Bobby had woken up, and he'd been distracted with Ro and finally, almost two days after he said he would, there he was, at her office door.

It was wide open, like she'd said it would be.  For some reason, this made him happy -- he'd always liked open door policies, both literally and figuratively. After all, how were people supposed to know what was expected of them if no one ever told them?

Even though it was open though, he still knocked slightly at the frame and grinned over at her.  She was busy doing something, and he almost felt bad for interrupting her. Almost.

"So where are these cookies," he asked cheekily. "I believe I was promised cookies."

His conversation with Ada still in the forefront, Scott eventually made his way to Ororo's office. It'd be the first time they'd spoken since the rescue, and he found himself missing the other woman.

They'd always been close, like brother and sister at times, and he felt bad for avoiding her, because, truth be told, that's what he was doing. 

He'd been acting like a spoiled child, and he was ashamed of it. If it hadn't been for the children's disappearance, he probably never would've snapped out of it, instead choosing to sulk and pout.

Heading upstairs, he knocked lightly on the door of her office. "Hey, Ro, you busy?"

Consciousness was one of those things that seemed pretty shaky to one Bobby Drake by the time it finally decided to return to him. His arms felt heavy, as did his legs, and there was a throbbing somewhere... he couldn't quite pin down where and a very maddening itch that some part of his brain just knew he couldn't get to, so it was going to make the itching even worse just to spite him. Of course.

He shifted a little, coughing as his eyes still refused to open. He wasn't sure he wanted them to, though. What if they were still in that place?

( A little bit of confusion )

There was no way he could sleep -- not while the mission was underway.  He sat by the communications console, and just monitored, waiting for something, anything.

Eventually, he got it, and soon later, the jet was landing and all the injured students (and god, there were so many) were herded down into the medlab almost immediately. 

Scott had stood by idly enough and he couldn't any longer.  Heading downstairs himself, he steeled himself for what he was about to find. Everywhere he looked, there was a student in pain, a student crying, a student without any emotion.  It made him hurt inside to see the children (and they'd always be children to him) like this.

Clearing his throat, he tried to find something to do, someway he could help but before he could, his eyes fell on the first student he saw.  Rogue. She was cradling an arm and he winced inside.

Without speaking, he walked over to her side, and leaned down to give her a hug, careful of both her arm, and her skin. He just couldn't find the words to say anything yet.

There were lots of things Alex Summers was good at. Pool, drinking games, flirting with women, those were his areas of expertise. Reuniting with the older brother he was sure didn't like him? That was scary to him. Scott was his only family though and if there was one thing he knew, it was that he wouldn't forgive himself if something happened and he wasn't there.

Shifting his bag from one shoulder to the other, he made his way towards the institute. He snapped his fingers idly, releasing tiny plasma waves. Alex's powers had always been rather hard for him to control but he had grown a lot since he had last met the X-Men. He pushed the buzzer on the gate and stood back to wait.

He had heard rumblings about things going down and hoped that he'd be welcomed. The last thing he needed was to be told there was no room. He sighed softly as he leaned against the fence.

Looking around the grounds, he wondered how much alike this institute and the old one were. It made him slightly bitter, the idea that Scott had grown up in this sort of atmosphere and he had been forced to live with his crazy foster family.

Who: Scott
What: Watching the others leave for the mission
When: Friday night
Rating: G?
Status: Closed

Who: Adelaide Russell, Scott Summers
What: Catching up for the first time in years
When: Mid-morning
Rating: PG-13
Status: Closed

It hadn't taken her long to realise that the mansion was too quiet. Way too quiet. It was an uncomfortable lack of sound rather than silence. The gaping hole where sound should be was glaringly obvious, she saw kids creeping down the hallways as if they were afraid to make noise, as if by that very act they would be bringing down the wrath of the worried staff on their heads.

Adelaide had been at the mansion for just less than a day, she'd unpacked and spent most of the time in her office, trying to get it just right. She allowed herself to be pedantic. Picky. The office needed to be just right so that she could do what she was supposed to be doing, that was helping the staff and students.

She might not have owed it to them, but she did to Xavier. And to Jean. Her heart lurched and her stomach twisted uncomfortably at the thought. She was so upset that she hadn't been there to say goodbye, to be part of the memorial service.

She cleared her throat and raked her fingers through her hair, the long, red strands now straightened, not curly like they used to be. Teeth snagged on her lower lip as she walked out of her office, her shoes clicking gently on the floor as she turned and pulled the door shut.

She didn't lock it, she had no need to.

Time was when these hallways were crammed with students, wall to wall and you couldn't stand there the way she was without getting jostled by someone or having to duck someone else's errant use of their powers.

So far she had only seen Logan briefly. He had not been the most verbose of people but considering what she had heard about the abductees she couldn't blame him. She knew Ororo was around somewhere, and Scott... But she had kept to herself, really. She didn't know if she could handle the blast from the past that seeing them would offer, even if the sights would be what she needed. That touch of familiarity in a place that now seemed so alien to her.

She just stood in the hallway for a moment, trying to get her bearings. The layout of the mansion wasn't the same as it used to be and she closed her eyes, talking to herself under her breath and making small gestures with her hands, trying to kinesthetically remember the routes.

( Tours, Talks and Memories )

Who: Adalene and Scot
What: meeting for the first time/talk of what's happened
When: late night
Rating: PG 13 for cussing probably

Adalene went back to her office at the force after finishing her work for the Senator. Or rather she went back to Sophia's office. Ignoring the confused stares as to her random sudden appearance at the office, she quickly went to her desk and started reviewing over some of her old cases. Though they still had links she couldn't find anything that would relate to the words she had overheard. Frustrated she threw all of her cases back in their boxes and left the office in the same determined way she had arrived.

Far past midnight Adalene sat at her usual place at her favorite bar. She often had secret meetings there for her cases. Now, she wasn't sure what she expected to find. Instead she sat there nursing her beer, already losing count to how many she had, and tried to go through all of the facts in her head. Nothing seemed to add up. She felt she was missing a huge chapter to the story.

The cigarette hung between his lips, lit by the tip of his finger. Smoke slowly curled up towards the ceiling, drifting lazily around his head as he looked out of the window of the rec room. It had been a long few days.

He had just got settled in when suddenly the few people he had spoken to went missing and the whole place was in chaos. Chaos was something that he could handle well enough, but he never really liked being immersed in it. A part of him had wanted to leave.

The cards moved between his hands quickly, the rustling sound being as reassuring to him as anything else, more reassuring, in fact, than anything else, even the rush of nicotine as he drew in a breath, feeling the rush coursing through him.

There was a pause in the movement as one hand lifted, snagging the filter between his fingers and blowing out the smoke. There were no kids in the room, he wasn't corrupting them or anything. Most of the kids he had seen were distressed to varying degrees because some of the staff and students had gone missing. Remy didn't know many of them, the few he had spoken to seemed okay and he hoped they got back alright.

If he could help, he supposed he should, but that all depended on whether or not the hairy, cigar-smoking headmaster would let him, or even wanted him to considering he was the new guy and a complete stranger, really. Though, he was an excellent locksmith (in a way) and also very good at getting out of places he didn't want to be in. Really, he would be an asset.

Not that there was any chance of anyone knowing that.

With the cigarette secured between his lips again, burning away happily to itself as he smoked it, he went back to shuffling the cards, each move getting more and more elabourate as his talented hands shifted and shuffled them.

Terry sang softly to herself in gaelic as she pushed the stroller along the path up to the school. "Don't worry, baby," she said softly to her daughter as they walked. "We'll be okay here. They'll keep us safe." That was probably directed to both of them. Logically, she knew that they were most likely holding up Charle's ideals but she wasn't exactly an easy girl to have around.

She took a deep breath and pushed a rebellious curl out of her face. "Your granddady used to work here. Banshee they called him. Sean Cassidy. He was so proud of that." Her father had gone through a lot and done a lot of things that he wasn't proud of but being an X-Men? That was always a bright spot.

Knocking on the heavy wooden door, she stepped back her hand slipping into the pocket of her coat. "Here goes nothing."

Ororo had spent the better part of the night in the Danger Room trying to get a handle on her temper. Spending hours letting her abilities rage at computer generated zombies had helped (whoever put that video game protocol in the Danger Room commands was a godsend), and the fire had cooled to an icy calm.

She'd just finished teaching her morning history class to a room full of students who knew something was up just based on her mood. Now she was waiting in her office for Logan and Scott to arrive so that they could 'discuss' the issue at hand.

She tapped her pen impatiently as she tried to grade papers while waiting. At this point she just wanted to get this over with.

Barefoot in the grass, a nice warmish evening, a mug of tea and a book. This was the perfect way to spend the evening, in Millie's opinion. The big problem was the the trees weren't quite big enough to curl beneath properly, but oh well. Sprawling on the grass was no hardship.

Millie walked with her book tucked under her arm, and her tea in her hand, trying to find that perfect spot. It had to be far enough away that she wouldn't risk getting run over, but close enough that she'd be fairly visible. With everything that was happening, she didn't want anyone worrying about her. She found her spot next to the new lilacs she'd planted a week or so ago.

She set the mug and book aside for a moment as she knelt in the grass. It was the work of a few moments the make the grass a little thicker and plusher to act as a sort of mattress she could sit and read on. Then she curled her knees up and sipped her tea as she just enjoyed the evening for a few moments.