Alex knocked on Lorna's door. He'd managed to get about two hours of sleep. It wasn't very good, but it was better than some of the nights he'd had with the X-men, Vietnam, and, hell, hanging around with the SSR. Internally he tried to rearrange the acronym. An old friend had mentioned that they were changing the name soon. Something about rebranding. It would take some getting used to.
Either way, he'd had a shower, a cup of coffee, and a shave. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough to wake him up. It was eight in the morning now, and the students would be crawling all over the place soon. His own time was more limited: Scott was going to be up soon, and if he didn't have breakfast with him after the day Scott had had, he knew it would be bad.
He envied Xi'an and Sam. They had managed to sleep through the hellish night they'd had downstairs, and he knew it was up to him to brief them on why there were terrorists in the basement. He felt that it wasn't up to him to brief them on the fact that they were Magda's children and Lorna's siblings. That decision lay with Lorna.
Usually it wouldn't be a big deal but, given what had happened the night before, there was no way that they could keep this quiet. Lorna was probably distraught, The Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver were probably pissed and irritable, and Magda was in shambles. Alex had seen her on his way up, and she hadn't even spoken to him. He figured she'd be taking a personal day off too.
But that was why he was up and knocking on Lorna's door. Officially Lorna had the day off of classes. That had been decided and announced even before she'd gotten radiation sickness. The effects of the radiation were gone, but her injury was still healing. Besides that, she probably needed some time off for personal reasons.
Personally, he'd rather he let the woman he love rest. This had slipped his mind the night before, and he cursed himself for it. If he'd been a bit more together, then he would've thought about this. The only thought in his mind at the time had been getting Lorna to a place where she could rest, that and the guilty giddiness that had come with her saying she loved him. Giddiness because she said it, guilty because of the giddiness in the current circumstances.
The door opened and Lorna answered, her expression wide awake. He was surprised. He'd expected that she would have fallen asleep immediately after going back to her room. That was what anyone else would have done. He was used to operating like this. Lorna wasn't.
Then he realized that there was a third option: she hadn't been able to sleep. He felt guilty for his surprise.
"Alex," she said, "Is something going on?"
"Nothing much," he said, clearing his throat, "Just um...it's getting later...and..."
"What time is it?" she asked.
"Oh, uh, eight," he said.
Lorna winced.
"I should've been down earlier," she sighed, "Class starts in an hour. I need to get things ready."
Alex paused, and then frowned.
"You don't have classes today," he said.
She blinked, looking slightly disoriented.
"You're going to spend some time recovering," Alex said.
"But I just got released from the hospital wing," said Lorna.
Her voice was quizzical. Good grief, did she want to get back to work that bad?
"For the radiation, yeah," said Alex, "Lorna, you had your entire shoulder burned. That's not going to go away overnight. I mean, the radiation was the biggest factor, and that's been taken care of, but you're still injured."
She rubbed her shoulder thoughtfully, wincing as she did so. Alex caught her hand and she looked at him, surprised.
"We talked about it yesterday," Alex said, "Hank should have told you. Remember?"
Lorna licked her lips, something he'd never seen her do before
"Sorry. I remember now," she said after a moment, "He said he was getting someone to cover for me. I guess I'm just a little out of it."
She slumped a little, the motion awkward. Alex sighed and let go of her hand. He moved it to her uninjured shoulder. Lorna looked down at his hand, almost wonderingly.
"It's okay," he said, "I know last night was pretty rough for you."
Lorna looked down. He wished she'd meet his eyes. After what she'd said last night, he wanted her to feel like she could confide in him. However, it was unfair of him to expect everything to happen at once, to just fall into place.
"And I'm sorry," he said, "But...Sam and Xi'an will be up soon. I need to know what to tell them."
She stiffened, her fingers curling.
"There's nothing to tell," Lorna said.
The tone was defensive, and he couldn't blame her. It wasn't easy saying your siblings were terrorists. But he had to tell them something. They were X-men, and there were Brotherhood members in the basement, and they needed to be told.
"There's a lot to tell," said Alex, "I know that you're...estranged from your brother and sister, but we need to tell Xi'an and Sam something. Your siblings don't seem shy about talking to you as their sister and I know that you, um..."
His tongue and brain suddenly meshed, and Alex realized how his statement sounded. From everything he'd seen last night, he could tell that Lorna still loved her brother and sister. Alex didn't really see why, but he was willing to trust Lorna. At one point or another her siblings must have been amazing people to inspire that kind of loyalty.
Personally Alex had never had trouble cutting ties to the people who betrayed him. It was why he looked at Magneto with such disgust. However, he hadn't talked the situation out with Lorna, and he knew that he needed to hear her side of the story before he went around passing judgment.
So talking like she should be ashamed of her brother and sister was probably not the best way to start things out. He expected her to look at him with at least mild irritation, but instead there was just an expression of calm expectation. She was waiting for him to continue.
As grateful as he was for it, it was still a little puzzling.
"I just figure that you deserve a chance to decide how this gets handled," he said.
She nodded, still very calm. He remembered the woman who'd cried over her siblings, like a dam that had burst being held back. Alex supposed that this was what came after the storm. He'd cried himself hoarse sometimes when he was little, his parents arguing, feeling lost in the world. After that there came a point where you couldn't cry anymore, where tears just seemed so stupid.
"Let's not tell them any more than they have to know," Lorna said, "I...given last night, I think that we might want to limit contact."
"Right," Alex said.
Downstairs, a bell went off. He sighed.
"That's the breakfast warning bell," he said, "I need to go find Sam and Xi'an, tell them that Xi'an's covering for your classes. I would but...given the current situation, the Professor has me on call."
"Of course," Lorna said.
He reached out and tentatively cupped her face.
"Are you gonna be okay?" he asked.
She smiled, the expression slightly forced.
"Yes," she said.
Alex smiled back, hoping that she knew he would be there for her. He leaned in and hesitated for a moment, before kissing her. In hindsight, a better kiss to comfort her might have been on the forehead or on the cheek. Her lips were slightly stiff beneath his. Kisses on the forehead in the future.
"I'll see you later," he said.
She nodded and slipped back into her room. Alex rubbed his forehead before going downstairs. Xi'an and Sam were headed to their classes, so it was easy to pull them aside so he could explain their situation.
They weren't happy, and he wasn't surprised. Alex still wasn't happy. Knowing that the man receiving medical attention was Lorna's brother didn't make anything easier. Quicksilver, Peter, whatever his name was or had been, was still an asshole. Just like every other member of the Brotherhood, he was selfish and blind. It was plain to see that him and his sister had already learned the art of using people and then discarding them that Magneto had mastered.
"Guys, it's not a good situation," he said, "I know that, but it's almost over."
"You should've woken us up," said Xi'an.
"It was three on three down there," said Alex, "And Quicksilver was pretty badly injured."
"Still should've woken us up," Xi'an said.
"Ah'm with Xi'an," said Sam, "What if somethin went wrong?"
Several somethings had gone wrong, but it wasn't the type of wrong that they were thinking of. At the time he'd been so busy trying to figure everything out that he'd thought better of actually getting Xi'an and Sam.
Alex tried to visualize the events of the night before with the two of them there. Internally, he shuddered.
"Look, we'll talk about this more later, I promise," he said, "But it's getting late. Xi'an, you're gonna hafta take over Lorna's class this morning. I'll relieve you in the afternoon and take over from there."
"Why aren't you covering all her classes?" asked Xi'an, "That's what you said yesterday evening-"
"Yesterday evening we didn't have three assholes in the basement," Alex said, "I know this isn't ideal, but we need to do what we can."
Sam laughed ruefully.
"Why couldn't y'all have set up a place where we do somethin other than teach?" he said, "Gets so darn complicated."
"I know, right?" said Alex.
He shook his head.
"Come on guys. I have to meet Scott for breakfast and then walk him to his class," he said, "Let's just pull together on this one."
Xi'an rolled her eyes in irritation and strode off to Lorna's class. Sam just gave him a half-hearted shrug and walked into the cafeteria. Alex followed shortly after, blinking back sleep and figuring that he would get another cup of coffee with breakfast. It needed to be black.
Thankfully, it wasn't difficult to spot Scott. His cousin was staring into his oatmeal, Ororo sitting next to him. She was making tentative attempts at conversation, but Scott wasn't answering. Alex poured himself a cup of coffee and began walking over, trying to figure out what to say to him.
He was so preoccupied that he nearly ran into Hank. His friend started, looking disoriented. Alex put a hand on his shoulder to balance him.
"You okay?" he asked.
"Fine. Just a little tired," Hank said.
"You had a long night," said Alex, "We need to get you your own coffee machine."
It was light talk, dodging the subject at hand. There were too many people listening.
"I'll see if there's room in the budget," Hank said, "Could you do me a favor?"
"Depends," said Alex, "I need to go and talk to my cousin before he goes to his classes."
"You can do this after," Hank said, "I was wondering if you could go tell Lorna her classes are taken care of today."
Alex frowned.
"Didn't you tell her that yesterday?" he asked.
"No. I was going to, but things got in the way," said Hank, "I just want her to know that it's all taken care of."
He opened his mouth for a minute, perhaps looking like a gaping fish. He wanted to ask Hank if he was sure, but it was Hank. He would be sure about something like that.
"Right," Alex said, "I'll talk to her later."
Hank gave him a grateful look and then headed for the coffee machine. For a moment Alex stared straight ahead. Logically, he supposed that Lorna might not be able to remember everything that had happened yesterday because of the stress. She might have lied to cover herself, to make her seem like she was more together than she was.
That all fell apart when he realized that it was Lorna he was talking about. He went over the conversation in his head, and then suddenly realized something else that had gone wrong: she hadn't asked about her mother.
An uneasy feeling started in his gut, and his grip on his coffee cup increased. He supposed that he could just brush it under the rug, but the last time he'd felt that uneasy feeling was when he was introduced to Lieutenant Stryker. He'd ignored it, and he'd nearly been dissected.
He took a deep breath and walked over to Scott. Yes, he certainly would be talking to Lorna later.
