Notes: Sorry about the delay in getting new chapters up. I promise I have a really good reason, and it's that I was publishing my own book in real life (*shameless plug* It's called "Rebel Rendezvous" and it's amazing :D) and got so caught up in all the last-minute editing and stuff like that… So really, anything that wasn't already written (like the 714 main universe and the TeamAwesomeLives Avenger Games story) sort of fell by the wayside while I was working on that….

Told you it's a really good reason.

Anyway, we're back now with a chapter of solid FLUFF. Because everyone needs fluff. Annie's school year is approaching soon, but I wanted them to have some time together on their own first… So… This happened ;)

CC: It's so fun writing Scott in the middle of this normal (but hectic) family, because I really do love writing him when he's out of his element. And he really, really is out of his element here. There's no impending apocalypse, no telepaths, no Phoenix, no… anything that he's used to dealing with here. What do?

And you know I love me some Leslie Ann. That girl is darling and hilarious and so good for everyone she is involved with, honestly. Just a little ball of sunshine.

Griezz: I… am not sure where you got Twilight out of that. I literally mean that telepathic relationships are vampiric in the dictionary sense of the word, in that they can drain the life (and soul) out of the people in them if the relationship is lopsided (which was the case with Scott's relationships).

That's not to say that telepaths can't have relationships (and I can't believe I'm pointing to ANGEL as an example but… look at Betsy and Warren. They've got this thing down). I'm just saying that an unhealthy telepathic relationship, like the one between Scott and Emma, is absolutely draining, which meets the dictionary definition of vampiric. Emma in particular literally would just take and take from Scott, and that's why she's gone in this universe. And good riddance to her.

As for Scott finally going for it… Give him a little credit ;) It took him a while to figure out non-telepathic romance, but he's a fast learner ;)

JD: That's a really good nit to pick and I 100% agree with your estimation of how Scott and Anton could have handled that conversation differently. And honesty, this military/X-men thing is actually one of the things I really like talking about with the X-Men is how they're different from the military while still being soldiers in their own right. *deep breath*

You're right that the X-Men are soldiers in their fight for their lives and freedoms, and Scott WILL defend them, but the context of that conversation with Anton makes a big difference. Anton isn't just talking about being in the Army; he was an Army brat, and therein lies the crucial difference between the X-Men and the military world, in my opinion. It's a totally different environment when it comes to having a family/being raised in the X-Men (which until this point, no one has been… even canon kids have been raised in different timelines, or, ultimately, outside the mansion and its influence).

See, the X-Men don't have the same luxuries of protection that the military does. They can't just have families on base and go about their jobs assured that their families and homes aren't going to be destroyed because of those jobs. That's really why not many X-Men (with very few exceptions at this point in time; we're fixing it in the 714) are settling down with families: they don't have that same assurance with the military or even the Avengers that the sky isn't going to come crashing down around them. For as often as the X-Men are targeted for out-and-out extinction, that's not exactly a great family-rearing environment. And since at this point in time, the X-Men are still split between Xavier's and then Emma's group (though Emma's group by this point has dissolved, but Scott hasn't seen the ramifications)... it's still not a good family environment, even if they ARE family to each other.

So yeah, Scott will defend his family, say that they are every inch the heroes that other uniformed heroes are… but they aren't like the military. The culture is entirely different. They're soldiers, but they are soldiers under constant siege even in their personal lives - and when you're meeting the family of someone like Annie, to whom family clearly means the world, a discussion of Army brats vs. constantly-in-danger X-Men family worries is probably not the best of ideas, so Scott goes with "my dad was a pilot" to explain that, yes, he remembers what growing up in the military was like. Because it is an entirely different experience to grow up in.

But that's just my view of how the X-Men v. military comparison would go. I fully agree that Scott should probably have been a little more like "hey. My family is awesome; back off," and that's a very good criticism. I should have given that a little more pause and maybe explained a little further where Scott's frame of mind was, and maybe shown that he saw the jab but didn't want to rise to it and get into the conversation of Army brat vs. X-Men brat, especially when "X-Men brat" is not really much of a thing (yet). The context of that conversation had me (and my inner Scott) on family in the military, not whether the X-Men generally count as military, which is why it took on the tone it did, if that makes sense!

(*phew* I didn't mean to go on a tangent… I just have a lot of feelings about how the X-Men don't get the same assurances and protections as other people who put their lives on the line… and am really excited that our universe is going to let them relax enough to finally let "X-Men brats" exist to the full extent of really letting them grow up in that environment :D… It just makes it even better that Scott's the one having twins back in the main story *spoilers for anyone who hasn't read that far lol* And they won't be raised outside the timestream! Woot!)

Oh, and as for Scott and Annie and bumps to come… You'll just have to see, though I'll be honest and tell you that a LOT of the bumps are in the 714 proper (what with Sinister poking his head in over there ugggghhh). This is the story of how they met and how they got engaged before Logan and Co. met up with him in Volume 3. So… it's not quite as bumpy. ;)

*pant pant* That was a lot of notes? So now I'm just going to get out of the way and put up the chapter for y'all. Sorry in advance that it's shorter than usual (omg I think it's only barely longer than the notes *facepalm*) but I wanted to just capture on moment in time... *makes presentation hands*

Chapter 14: Gone Fishing

The thing that surprised Scott most of all was how quickly he had fallen into a normal routine with Annie. He woke up before she did, kissed her forehead, headed off to the library, spent the day shelving books, and came home to find Annie trying out some new recipe, humming old country songs.

If someone had told him that he would be doing this with his life, he would have laughed them off. But here he was, working a day shift, learning how to make sweet tea exactly the way Annie liked it, losing horribly in Yahtzee every time he played Annie and accusing her of somehow rigging the game — though of course, that just wasn't possible from her.

But today was a Saturday, and that meant he was sleeping in — the library opened early, after all, and with a weekly schedule, his weekends wouldn't require a pre-dawn wakeup call. He had always been a morning person, but he and Annie had been up late the night before, out to a late-night movie before they came back home — and they'd been up later than that afterward.

He still woke up before Annie did, though since he didn't have anywhere to be, he didn't move except to pull the covers up a little more around both him and Annie.

She always slept on the very edge of the bed, curled up practically in the corner, even though she had an entire queen to herself before he showed up. So when he'd started to share a bed with her, that cocooning behavior meant that he often didn't have any blankets halfway through the night.

It didn't bother him, especially not when it was still the end of the summer, but Annie was embarrassed enough by it that there was a blanket folded at the end of the bed in case he got cold — and he knew he would once the winter really got rolling.

He still couldn't believe he was thinking ahead to staying that long. Or that he wanted to.

The blanket was still folded at the end of the bed, but Annie hadn't stolen all of the blankets that night — it was probably too warm. Whatever the case, he was able to pull the covers over his shoulders and settle in behind her. She was still sound asleep, her mouth partly open and her hair absolutely everywhere, her knees curled up almost to her chest as always.

Annie was a morning person, too — so it wasn't long before she started to stir awake, though she was also not in any mood to move anywhere as she leaned back into Scott. And now that he knew she was awake, he shifted so that his arm was draped over her and pulled her just a little bit closer.

She turned so that she was facing him instead of facing the very, very edge of the bed and rested her forehead against his bare chest, smiling as she wrapped her arms around him.

"G'morning," she mumbled tiredly.

He grinned. "Morning."

"Shouldn't you be at work?"

"It's Saturday."

"Right."

He couldn't help smiling at her. Even though she liked being up in the morning so that she could get things done, that didn't mean she was necessarily as fast to wake up as he was. Once he was awake, he was awake. Annie… took her time.

But she was that way about just about everything.

He still couldn't believe how easy this was. The routine. The normalcy of it all. He couldn't believe that he had a job that he could just… be done with when he came home. There were no emergency calls, no late nights…

He missed it, obviously. He missed the challenge of a good problem to solve. He missed feeling like he was part of something … well. Bigger than a local library. He missed the purpose.

But he didn't miss it at the same time. He didn't miss losing friends. He didn't miss the nights staying up desperately working against the clock — and sometimes still losing friends or innocents anyway. He didn't miss being shot at, being hated, being hunted down.

But it really wasn't about the library job anyway. It was about the steadiness, the normalcy, the routine that meant he got to come home every single day to Annie. It meant she knew when he'd be home, so they could plan things like a night out at the movies without some supervillain bursting into the middle of all of it.

Annie loved old movies, and there was a theater just a five-minute drive from the townhouse that played old movies every Friday night. It wasn't overly popular — there was a Saturday matinee that drew most of the audience for the oldest stuff — but that just meant they had the theater to themselves.

Scott preferred it that way, not just because it was more fun to sit in a mostly-empty theater and watch Annie's openly gleeful expressions at every part of the movies she'd seen a hundred times over, but because the area where they lived was still a small enough town that people knew who he was — and still hadn't forgiven him for being who he was and for staying in town.

Actually, it was the first time he'd heard Annie swear when someone at the theater had tried to say something to her about it — warn her off. And Scott hadn't even said a word, just let her say her piece and then leave in a huff, while he just shook his head at her, doing a horrible job of ignoring how much he wanted to kiss her when she got so defensive.

Now, curled up with Annie, he kissed the nape of her neck and grinned at her. "Any plans for this weekend?"

"Actually," she said, and he only grinned wider, since that was Annie — always looking for something new to do, to read, to bake, to experience. "I was thinking we'd do something you chose this time."

Scott raised an eyebrow and let out a breath as he thought it over. "What about that bookstore—"

"The one that I like?" Annie said. "No, we need to find something for you." She sat up a little, and he sat up with her, slightly, up on one elbow as he watched her with his brow wrinkled. "I grew up on bases. I can play any sport… sort of… we can go to a baseball field or toss a football around or…"

Scott laughed. "Really, I'd love to go to the drive-in or—"

"—or if you like boating,we can rent something for a weekend," Annie continued, undeterred. "Come on, Scott. You have to give me something here!"

"I'm not a big fan of the water," Scott said with a smirk, thinking of Alex. "I mean, I'll go fishing, but—"

"Then let's go fishing," Annie said. "Let's do something different."

"Are you sure?" he asked, not sure where this was coming from. They had been exploring parks, different restaurants, had even been down to the beach, after all. "We could go for a drive or a hike if you don't like fishing."

"If I decide I don't like fishing, I will bring a book," Annie replied, tossing the covers aside.

He shook his head at her as he watched her pull some clothes out of the closet. "What's the occasion?"

"What?"

"I mean, why the change? I'm fine with hiking or going to the beach-"

Annie waved her hand at him. "No reason. I just thought — I mean — it's not fair to only do things that I like to do. And besides, Mr. Summers, you can only coast on tall, dark, and mysterious for so long before I want to get to know you."

He watched her with a totally bemused expression as she pulled the shirt over her head. "Alright," he said at last as he got out from under the covers, still shaking his head at her. "Have you ever fished before?"

"Not really, no," she admitted as she grabbed a brush to run it through her wild bedhead.

"Do you want to learn?"

"I'll try anything once," she said with a confident little grin and one hand on her hip as she pointed the hairbrush at him. "Didn't you say you were a teacher? Come on, then. It should be a simple thing to teach a teacher, right?"

He smirked. "I don't know; it might be like doctors being the worst patients…"

"Oh, honestly."

He smirked more widely at her reaction. "Well, it might."

They ended up spending the whole weekend out fishing — simply enjoying each other's company and the quiet stillness of the water around them.

It had been a long time since Scott had gone fishing — a long time since he'd done anything that could be considered a "hobby" for him — but he got right back into it easily enough. It wasn't hard to do. Annie, on the other hand, had tried, but it simply wasn't her cup of tea, she told him. That didn't mean she wanted to leave or go home, of course — she was curled up with a good book and a pair of sunglasses on the shore.

By the time Sunday evening rolled around and the sky started to get dark, Scott was surprised by how, well, surprised he was to see the sky darkening. He clearly hadn't kept very good track of time — he had been enjoying himself far too much. And that in itself… it just didn't happen often. At all.

He packed up his gear and the fish he'd caught — he would grill them up for Annie when they got home — before he felt Annie wrapping her arms around him from behind, pressing her cheek into the spot between his shoulders with a contented sigh.

"We should do this more often," she decided.

"Go fishing?" He raised both eyebrows. "But you didn't like it."

She swatted him playfully and laughed into the back of his shirt. "I didn't like fishing. I liked being with you when you're so … relaxed. And I finished my book, so it was fun for me too, I promise."

He smirked and turned around so that he could see her better and pull her chin up to steal a kiss. "Trust me, Annie. I just enjoy being around you. That's all this is."

"Oh, sure," she teased, though she returned the favor and stole a kiss right back. "We still should take weekends like this more often. You and me… away from everything else."

"Us against the world?" he said, matching her smile with one that had a lot more of a teasing overtone to it.

"Us against nature and a snapping fishing rod," she said, matching his tone with a smile as she draped her arms around his middle and tried (and failed) to look properly sheepish over her inability to fish without breaking the equipment on the first day.

"I didn't know you could swear like that," he teased, smiling as he remembered her frustrated look, before he leaned down to kiss her again and she laughed into the kiss.

"You remember that I was an Army brat?" she pointed out.

"I might have heard you mention it once or twice," he said, though he wasn't quite as focused on the conversation as he could have been, instead starting to kiss her neck. None of this was new, after all, and he was in a great mood after their weekend out.

She rolled her eyes at him but didn't make a move to stop him, either, sliding her hands around his waist as he worked his way very slowly and gently up to her jaw. When he finally got around to kissing her mouth, she had her hands knotted in his shirt too.

"What time do we have to check out of the cabin?" she murmured softly as he picked her up to carry her — so he could reach her better to keep up with the kisses.

"We've got an hour."

She smiled at that and reached up to run her fingers through his hair. "A whole hour," she said with a little smile that had him grinning wider as he carried her — forgetting about the truck all packed up and ready to go with their equipment in the truck bed when he had a gorgeous woman in his arms.