PART THREE: Paying Heed
Warren had finally made his way up to the sick bay, flying through corridors with little regard to personal safety or at least the safety of persons other than himself, and feeling somewhat breathless following the flight upstairs, the danger room session and his 'exercise' with Miss Guthrie that morning, he charged into the sickbay.
"Don't worry I can save him!" he shouted with a flourish of his eldritch sword and noticing the bemused stares and looks of what was clearly stupefied awe he added, "My amazing mutant blood factor will save him!"
"Yes, Warren, it's already saving him, now please don't wave that sword round like that you'd have someone's eye out if you're not careful," admonished Annie with all the experience in dealing with easily excitable males that having a ten year old telekinetic son brought to her.
"What do you mean, already?" cried Warren bemused and upset by the removal of his chance to show off his amazing blood power again. He'd only saved seven kids with leukaemia that week and was feeling underappreciated. He also wanted to show Paige what a caring nurturing type he was and using his powers to save a team-mate would surely impress, and not any team-mate but his gay team-mate so not only was he caring and nurturing but also unprejudiced and accepting. And if Paige ever went flouncing off in a sulk the way Betsy used to, he'd have a useful ally in Jean-Paul. That's what girls do, don't they? They talk about all their problems to their gay best friend, and he was pretty darn sure that Northstar was the only gay man Paige knew. He could see it now Paige pouring out her heart and being reassured that indeed she was the luckiest woman alive with Northstar saying, "Oh but sure all men can be asses sometimes and anyway, Paigey darling, the man saved my life once and he does look just like Brad Pitt with wings." Warren considered the Sex And The City Marathon Paige had made him watch pretty good research into the intricacies of the female mind.
"The blood you gave us last week, you do remember that, Warren, don't you? We gave Jean-Paul a transfusion from that," Annie's vocal talents had clearly been honed with years of dealing with little boys and rather confused, it not comatose, patients to the point where it was her automatic response and a man with wings carelessly wielding an inappropriately large sword wasn't much different from an old man in a wheelchair who'd somehow mislaid his wife. Speaking slowly and calmly seemed to work as well at Xavier's as it did in her old hospital, except of course, where Dr McCoy was involved. When he got excitable, it was normally because he wanted to express his latest amazing discovery, and really, Annie always had time for that, using epoxy resin to build a dimensional bridge between here and the negative zone and use that to power a large medical refrigerator, using only twice the energy they already did, was so very interesting.
"Hey Annie! He's awake! My favourite Canadian is awake!" Bobby's voice came from an adjoining room.
Annie rushed into the room with Warren trailing in behind her, tucking his wings in tight to get through the narrow doorway and eager for the grateful thanks he was sure he was going to receive.
Northstar was propped up in bed with a drip snaking out of his arm. To the average person he would have looked rather chipper for somebody with fifteen broken ribs, a broken leg, a punctured lung and concussion; to an X-man, who would know better, he looked like a typical recipient of the Feed-Him-Some-Of-Warren's-Blood-And-See-What-Happens Treatment (there was a serious need to find a name which made a decent if not utterly cool acronym); that is a little dazed and maybe just a tad excitable.
Kurt was perusing intently the Shi-Ar medical monitor by the side of the bed, which was beeping intently. "All readings are returning to normal, that is normal for a French-Canadian who can focus the kinetic energy of all his molecules and fly but needs to learn not to rush in and attack without thinking. The fractures are all knitting and projections suggest that the process will be finished within twenty-four hours. Annie, you really must take the Shi-Ar for beginners course, you really can't count on me always reading the displays for you."
"Kurt, I don't need to. I've been working in hospitals long enough to know what the machines mean. If they beep too much or too little, the patient's in trouble and if they beep just right the patient's just right too. How did you learn Shi-Ar anyway? It must have been more glamorous than language classes at any rate."
"Well, my ex-girlfriend was Shi-Ar and she gave me some language lessons. She thought I was quite a good linguist," said Kurt, who then realised what he had just said, blushed a brilliant purple and promptly disappeared in a cloud of sulphurous smoke. Everyone stopped laughing and choked briefly on the dispersing smoke.
Jean-Paul smiled and turned to Warren and Annie, "My sincerest thanks to my medical saviours and would you mind if I thanked my rescuer in private?"
"Sure, J-P, I've got to see to Jolene down the corridor, she's moulting," said Annie briskly, "Come on, Warren, I'm sure you've got things to do." Annie marched out into the main sick bay and Warren trouped along behind her with pride bursting in his chest and anticipating telling Paige how he had saved the Northstar.
"Bobby, please tell me what you said wasn't a hallucination bought on by loss of blood."
"What, that Annie refrigerates the thermometers?" said Bobby trying to feign innocence and failing.
"No. You. Me. Us." Northstar was too flustered to even articulate a sentence let alone a sardonic put-down.
"For someone so handsome, you can sure be stupid," said Robert Drake the cliché-meister himself.
"Really?"
Bobby didn't answer but bought his face down towards Northstar's and they kissed their mouths open and eager. Northstar's hand was in his hair holding him close and this felt perfect and loving, nothing like those awkward fumblings with Opal or Lorna, now he felt no need to break away and breathe, it was as if he had learnt to survive upon passion rather than air.
Outside in the corridor Kurt had found Warren and was intent on giving him a piece of his mind since it was clear that he had none of his own, "Warren du total Dummkopf! Whatever possessed you to disengage the safety locks and set the computer to your voice commands alone. What if there had been a worse accident? What if you had been injured? What would we have done then, o noble leader?"
They paid no heed to this, much though it would have delighted Northstar in any other circumstances to see the winged wonder Warren Worthington the Third to be taken down a peg or two. But these weren't "any other circumstances" the most impossible of things had happened and he now had Bobby Drake in his arms and in his mouth. The small part of his brain that wasn't set upon the beautiful and much longed for man he was kissing was seriously considering the potential of the bed below him ignoring entirely the broken leg and cracked ribs, thinking only of bliss and fulfilment.
Annie was walking past the observation window and glanced in. "Frostboy!" the tray of instruments she had been carrying crashed upon floor the unnoticed as she froze rapt.
They paid no heed to this either. Much as Bobby enjoyed a good accident, particularly one precipitated by the common or garden snowball, nothing short of Brad Pitt dancing around naked screaming, "Take me!" would have distracted him now, and maybe not even that since Brad was unreal, unlike Jean-Paul who at that moment was very real indeed with his firm kisses and his hand trailing up the inside of his shirt and caressing his ribs.
Kurt and Warren ran toward the source of the noise and they too were struck still, Kurt with a mysterious satisfied smile on his face, Warren in rampant disbelief.
They paid no heed to this either. While Northstar would have loved to say some snide comment along the line of "I'm gay. What did you expect?" at this juncture, there remains the fact that he was simply unaware of his audience and his mouth was far too busy. Furthermore his mind was occupied with higher things such as "I know this is a bit sudden, but would he really mind if I rip his clothes off?"
Warren ran into the room.
They paid heed to this, as it's surprising how distracting a furious angel shouting abuse can be.