10/30 Issue: Spilling the Caffeinated Beans

[Svartfreja]

Timelined for after the condom Jeamie.


<Carol> Carol was spending an unusually long morning in her office, going through several reports of violence in the wake of various political rallies. She had the awful sinking feeling that it was only going to get worse as she got up to make a fresh pot of coffee. Checking the time, she considered maybe also ordering lunch and sending a quick message to Andi to remind her that lunch was a thing that she should do sometime too, otherwise Silence was getting more pizza with tiny salty fish.

<Jean> Jean was playing with her keys on her way into the big haunted nuthouse. They orbited her head as she came through the door and floated immediately to the kitchen to make herself a free fancy coffee. Perks!

<Carol> There was nothing that interested her in the fridge so, either way, Carol was ordering her lunch from somewhere. She leaned on the counter and scrolled her take-out options while she waited on the percolator. Someone needed to invent a faster way for a jug of coffee. Maybe she'd suggest it to Tony next time she saw him.

<Jean> Ooo, coffee and a hot blonde! Perks! Jean attempted a hello brain poke as she floated into the kitchen. "Hi!"

<Carol> Carol looked up at the brain poke and gave Jean a smile, "Hey! You hanging out here today?"

<Jean> "Yeah! Redd's doing inventory and I have learned to just step back and let her have her way with it." She made a coy face at Carol. "Y'know how she can get."

<Carol> Carol's eyebrow lifted in response to that look, "Do I?" she glanced at the coffee pot. Still not finished.

<Jean> "Do you?" She raised an eyebrow back. "You should." Jean giggled and went to the syrups to find a good one.

<Carol> "What's she been telling you?" Carol slid her phone into her pocket and moved to take a fresh mug out of the cupboard for her coffee whenever it felt like being ready.

<Jean> "Entirely not enough!" She opened her purse and let her keys settle into the bag, then floated the purse to the table.

<Carol> That made her laugh, "You don't have enough sex with Jamie you have to try and live vicariously through Redd?"

<Jean> "Live vicariously?" She laughed, shaking her head. "Nope, but I love me some hot steamy tea." Jean flipped her hair. "Then I share it with Jamie!"

<Carol> And now both her eyebrows were up, "Okay now I feel violated."

<Jean> "By which part, because Redd totes isn't sharing, hence the fishing expedition. And you know I share a brain with Jamie." She found the caramel and chocolate syrup and moved to fire up the espresso machine.

<Carol> "That you'd try to get details and share them with Jamie!" she wrinkled her nose, "Don't do that. It's not cool. I know him and he's judgy."

<Jean> "Jamie knows what I know. I know what Jamie knows. It's how our link works. He has to work to hide something from me and after our... um, epic misunderstanding I don't hide things from him." She giggled. "He's... opinionated."

<Carol> "Uh-huh and his opinions are judgy," she nodded, picking up the coffee pot as it was finally done, "I have enough of that in my life, thanks. No details for you."

<Jean> Jean popped out her lip in an epic pout and leaned so Carol would be sure to see it.

<Carol> "Nope," she shook her head, "Not gonna work. You're just going to have to use your imagination instead. I'm sure you can manage."

<Jean> "Is imagination code for telepathy?" She batted her lashes while the espresso machine whined.

<Carol> "Absolutely not," she armed the finger-gun in preparation. "There's all kinds of junk in my brain you don't want to know."

<Jean> Jean laughed and held up both hands. "I'm joking. Brain spelunking without invitation is Beth's thing, not mine."

<Carol> "Lucky for me, I have natural defences against all of that." Mmmm coffee. She took a satisfying inhale before she had her first sip from her fresh cup.

<Jean> "I bet I could totes get past them if I wanted," she said, then shrugged and turned back to fix her own fluffy coffee treat. "But I don't want to, so hey!"

<Carol> "You probably could but it'd be uncomfortable for both of us and I'd for sure notice you were there," she glanced in the direction of Beth's room, wondering if the girl was even in today. "No one wants to be in my head right now. Especially not me."

<Jean> Two pumps of thiiiiis, and three pumps of thaaaat, add milk... "Aww, why's that? Your head seems fun what with all the zappy powers."

<Carol> "The powers are fun. The stuff I have going on in my brain not so much. I have a lot on my mind right now... A lot of stuff to worry about."

<Jean> Jean found a spoon and set it to stirring as she turned to look at Carol again. "Like what? Is President Stark disbanding the X-Men?!"

<Carol> She shook her head, "Tony wouldn't do that. The team's his-" she paused and self-edited "... his legacy." She had another sip of coffee, "Norman though? He'd pull the plug the second he got an excuse."

<Jean> She took note of the pause and eyeballed her, then dismissed it and turned back to make sure her coffee was fluffed enough. "Yeah Osborn is creepy AF. I really, really hope he doesn't win."

<Carol> "Yeah... me too. The idea of having to take orders from him...?" It made her feel physically sick, if she was honest about it. "I want to throw his ass into The Sun."

<Jean> "Ooooo, I'd totally help." She picked up her coffee and took a sip, making a pleased noise. "Ahhhh. The only way to make it better is to add some of my special tincture..."

<Carol> "Can you even survive in space?" Carol was happy to skip down this tangent with Jean if she didn't have to think about all the stuff in her brain. Jean's brain was pink and fluffy.

<Jean> "I don't know. Maybe? My teke bubbles are pretty wicked... but I feel like the phoenix could totally handle space... aaaaand, you know, might be from space." She sipped again and nodded.

<Carol> "Yeah but there's no oxygen in space and it's cold... like colder than Bobby. It doesn't effect me because temperature and pressure extremes don't really do anything to me..." she frowned a little, "I mean... we could explore it if you wanted..."

<Jean> No oxygen in space. "You know where else there's no oxygen? Underwater." She shivered and fought to shake it off. "The phoenix saved me when Arcade tried to drown me..."

<Carol> "There's oxygen... otherwise fish would die... just people aren't designed to breathe water... in theory, you could filter the oxygen out of the water if your fine control works on a molecular level... maybe even with a teke bubble."

<Jean> Jean wasn't listening anymore, she was there, gasping in that tank while Arcade cackled about ducking the witch. Dimly she heard something about control and remembered she had that, snapping herself out of it with a deep, shaky breath. "Oooookay. Yeah. Maybe I'm not ready for space..."

<Carol> Carol turned to put her coffee down then moved to wrap her arms around Jean - loosely though, in case of panic. "We don't have to do it today. Whenever you want, I'll fly you up as high as you wanna go and take you right back down when you say it's enough. Space is beautiful... more people should see it."

<Jean> Jean swallowed and assured Jamie she was okay, putting down her own cup to return the hug. "It's not space itself... I just... it made me think of Arcade." She winced a little and then shrugged. "I'm still a work in progress."

<Carol> "That's okay," she gave Jean a small squeeze when she returned the hug, "Pretty sure everyone's a work in progress forever after trauma like that..." She for sure hadn't been the same since The Brood. "As long as you don't keep it to yourself, I'm pretty sure you can count it as actual progress though."

<Jean> "Jamie and I talked about it a little a couple days ago... and by talk I mean I cried a lot and he consoled." She gave a weak laugh. "We decided I should start seeing Jess again."

<Carol> "Probably a good idea," she agreed, "I know I should talk about stuff myself... but I'm not there yet. Not sure I'll ever be."

<Jean> "Oh come on, we can compare trauma! It'll be fun." Her tone was weak, but she really was amused at the idea. "Like a competition for the worst prize ever."

<Carol> She gave a small laugh and shook her head, Jean got another squeeze before she let her go to pick up her coffee again, "I have enough current shit going around in my head right now without digging up stuff from five years ago. The space bugs ruined Star Wars day for me forever."

<Jean> "Well that sucks. Captain Kirk is kinda hot. The new one, not the old guy." She retrieved her own coffee and took a sip, making a happy noise. "Well, then tell me about your current shit! I have some of that too, TBH."

<Carol> Carol gave Jean a hard stare. She had to be joking. Right? "Please tell me you're kidding and you do actually know the difference between Star Wars and Star Trek."

<Jean> "Oh. Wait. Is that the one with the laser swords?" She twirled a long curl in thought, totally missing the death glare.

<Carol> "Yes, Star Wars has lightsabers and a Wookie that my not-cat is named after and Han Solo," Carol sighed, "You need to watch some movies."

<Jean> She snapped her fingers. "Han Solo! He was hot too." She grinned. "Yeah, where is your alien cat?" Jean looked around for the creature. She was cute.

<Carol> Carol looked around too out of paranoia, "Not sure. I came here under my own steam today so she's probably still in New York... Oh yeah... she can teleport with people. I found that out the hard way."

<Jean> "Oooo, is it a scary portal thing or just a pop from place to place, because that'd be handy." She took a drink. "The hard way? What happened?"

<Carol> "It's a pop... like a literal pop. It makes the sound. Also there's pink goo so you'd love it." She sipped her coffee, "Jamie called me about some guy you guys found that's living here now and I was at Obi's place and I guess Chewie decided I needed to take less than five minutes to get all the way here from another State..."

<Jean> "Pink, yes; goo.... eeew..." Her perky nose wrinkled up. "Oh, the sword guy! Shatterstar! He's... interesting. Him and Jamie do noooot get along."

<Carol> "It doesn't get on you," Carol assured her, "It's like a bubble... it's hard to explain. Anyway, Jamie vouched for him... sorta... so now he has ID courtesy of SHIELD and he lives here so... watch out for that."

<Jean> "Jamie vouched for him?" That sounded unlike her love, but hey. "Oh, so kinda like my teke bubbles, only they can transport you? Sweet!" Jean did glance around the kitchen as if the guy would appear with swords drawn any moment. "That poor guy needs a better name, because yikes."

<Carol> "Well his ID says Benjamin so I guess that's his name now." Carol shrugged, "He was cagey about his birthname. I know it, because someone had to take him to the SHIELD brains, but it's up to him if he tells anyone else."

<Jean> "Oooo, Imma call him Benjie!" She nodded in agreement with herself and took a slurp of her coffee. "SHIELD has brains? Are we sure about that?"

<Carol> "They have brains. They also have telepaths. There's a whole psi division. They have mutants of all shapes and sizes working in their bunkers doing shifty spy stuff."

<Jean> "They have telepaths that aren't me?" She sniffed. "Must not be very good telepaths. Jamie does shifty spy stuff freelance!"

<Carol> "They have a lot of telepaths. You already have two jobs, do you actually want to work with SHIELD?"

<Jean> "Nope, but as the telepathiest telepath around I like to think I'm indispensable everywhere." She grinned and took another drink.

<Carol> "I feel like Beth might argue that point with you but I don't even know how you measure telepathy so..." Carol returned the grin, "I find psychic powers kinda terrifying, not gonna lie. I already know stuff I don't want to know. If I was able to hear what other people were thinking?" She shook her head, "No thanks."

<Jean> "Beth is good, but like I said, consent is totes a thing." She nodded. "They are terrifying if you can't control them. My empathy came first, then teke, and that was bad enough. I thought I was going to go crazy when my telepathy manifested."

<Carol> "Yeah... I just broke a lot of stuff. So much stuff. I still break stuff," she laughed. "Sometimes even on purpose."

<Jean> "Breaking stuff is totally therapeutic," she agreed with a nod.

<Carol> "Oh yeah. I love smashing things when I'm mad. Another reason you should go to space - there's all kinds of junk up there you can smash and also asteroids. The government likes it when I get rid of space junk - makes it easier to put more satellites up there."

<Jean> Jean giggled and sipped her coffee. "Okay yeah that sounds fun. I've done a little bit of demo work for Jamie at the tenement, but he totes thinks it's cheating."

<Carol> "It's not cheating, you're using the gifts you were born with. It's natural talent," Carol determined, "Jamie needs to get his head out of his ass sometimes."

<Jean> "That's what I said! Well, not the head in his ass thing..." She twirled a lock of hair. "He was mostly joking. He just likes to use his muscles to do the manual labor... not that I'll complain when he does it shirtless." Jean gave Carol a wicked grin.

<Carol> Her nose wrinkled spectacularly, "So.... he'd be okay with me helping? Actual heavy lifting?"

<Jean> "He's a do it himselves kinda guy," she laughed at the nose wrinkle.

<Carol> "I guess when you can pop out your own work crew... but some people would call that cheating." She turned to top up her coffee and looked in the direction of her office. Nope. Not enough caffeine for that yet.

<Jean> "Some people, yes, but not him," she agreed, taking a sip. She saw her looking over her shoulder. "Don't let me keep you from something important. I should see if Dr. McCoy is here anyway."

<Carol> She shook her head, "Nothing that can't wait 'til I feel like doing it. I have like a hundred reports to go through so I'm taking my time for my sanity." She focused back on Jean properly, "Dr McCoy? Everything okay?"

<Jean> "Ew, that's a lot." She shrugged. "I'm fine, I just need to get back on birth control. I was on the pill before, but obviously it didn't work... and I haven't been on anything since, um, you know..."

<Carol> "Since Arcade? That's a while..." she tried to recall if she'd seen Hank today. Nope. "He might be here. He tends to lurk in his own lab though until he runs out of coffee and snacks." She should hang out with Hank more, they had so much in common!

<Jean> "Yeah we've just been careful, and we even talked about maybe trying to have a baby now." She chewed her lip, then checked for the blue doctor's presence down in the medlab. Yup! "I should take him some Twinkies," she decided and the door to the snack cabinet swung open for her perusal.

<Carol> "I'm sure he'd welcome a fresh box of his favourite vice," Carol agreed with a grin, "You're really thinking about trying for a kid?"

<Jean> "We want kids... it's just a matter of whether we do it now or wait until after we're married." She straightened her little pink ring and floated a box of Twinkies to the counter. The cabinet door swung closed again.

<Carol> "Well can you at least get Beth to work on her fine control before you gotta go on maternity leave? That's all I ask," she teased. Despite the uncomfortable reminder that they were already down a team member for pregnancy.

<Jean> "Well you're in luck we've decided to wait," she laughed. "I'm gonna ask the doctor for another implant, like I had in school. I said no fat ass for the wedding for me!"

<Carol> She laughed, "Well, that's a relief." Assuming they still had jobs after the election. She really needed to stop thinking about this stuff, it was depressing. And all the stuff with Rogue, Tony and Bobby made her cranky and made her head hurt. Why was life so complicated? It wasn't even her life and it was making her life complicated. Stupid Rogue.

<Jean> Jean giggled in response, then stopped at the sudden swing in Carol's mood. Okay, wow. She cocked her head, not trying to listen to Carol's thoughts, but wow was there turmoil in that blonde head and some of it was hella familiar. "What did Rogue do now?" she blurted, then froze.

<Carol> Carol also froze, her expression startled before she actually focused on her mental shields and slammed them up. Bad brain! No leaking! "Nothing specific," she shook her head, "We're... just not really on good terms right now."

<Jean> "Sorry! I wasn't trying to snoop, but you've got a lot going on in there and your mood like totally tanked and I felt it and... sorry." She bit her lip, expression sheepish.

<Carol> "Yeah..." she pinched the bridge of her nose with her free hand, "I have a lot on my mind... that's why I don't do the sleeping thing so well."

<Jean> "Rogue came to see me... wanted to know if I had sensed anything from that senator at the rally..."

<Carol> "That rally she wasn't supposed to be at?" She sighed at herself, "Sorry... Just... I can't believe she did that."

<Jean> "That's the one, yeah. Of course now, she really can't show up at those kinds of things."

<Carol> Carol gave her a questioning look at that comment. Now she was curious, "What do you know?"

<Jean> "Bobby and Jamie are drinking buddies. I know everything." She nodded and took a drink. "Well, about the weirdest love triangle ever and President Stark's secret love child."

<Carol> "Do you know how bad it is? Like... the whole thing of how bad it is? Because I need someone else to know that so I don't explode."

<Jean> "Well, it's pretty bad, and I heard about you and Bobby, too..." She checked to make sure they really were alone, and nobody was on this floor and she couldn't sense Beth in the building. Whew.

<Carol> She shook her head, waving that off, "What happened with Bobby and I doesn't even matter. Do you know what Rogue's delusional ass thinks is going to be the outcome of all of this? Her 'deal' with Bobby?" Her rage was rising but she stamped it down. Didn't have time for a meltdown today.

<Jean> "That she's going to leave the president for him? Yeah. Her shields are even worse than yours so I got a lot from her before she even started talking."

<Carol> She turned to put her coffee down and folded her arms, "I hate knowing that. I hate knowing any of this... I tried to stop her getting involved with Tony in the first place... And he's so fucking happy... and she's going to destroy him and I can't even warn him or anyone close to him so they can at least prepare or something..."

<Jean> "I don't think she knows what she's doing. She really is torn between Bobby and President Stark. I told her to stay with Tony Stark. I mean, duh. He's hot, he's rich, she loves him, and she's having his baby."

<Carol> "Yeah she should stay with Tony. He forgave her for her 'slip' with Bobby... but now? All this sneaking around plotting behind his back while she's pregnant with his kid? No one's gonna forgive that. No one with any self respect. She keeps making it worse. How can she just keep making it worse like no one's feelings matter but hers? Bobby's totally messed up."

<Carol> She dug her nails into the tops of her arms to keep her from flailing, "Meanwhile she's expecting me to ruin everything for her or whatever when she's doing a damn fine job of it all on her own and all I fucking wanted was for her to be honest with Tony and she threatened to kill me."

<Jean> "She did what?!" Jean's mouth dropped open, but as she thought about it, the level of unstable she'd sensed from Rogue sounded about right for crazy threats.

<Carol> "Oh, she didn't mention that part, huh? Figures." She sighed, wanting a drink more than ever. "Yeah after I told her to tell Tony about making out with Bobby, I went to see Sebastian in case Tony had some kind of reaction and then he went to see Rogue... and Rogue decided that was my fault, even though if I'd known he was gonna do that I'd have dropped him off in China without his wallet."

<Carol> "Rogue and I have a history... everyone knows that... we'd just put it all behind us after Arcade... my mom accepted her into our family... and then she comes up yelling at me about endangering her family and threatens to use her powers on me again. She's the only one endangering her family. And what about mine? I have a kid. She doesn't care."

<Jean> "Okay, that's... well that's crazy." Jean swallowed at the wash of emotion she felt from Carol and put her cup down, stepping close to Carol to put her arms around her. "I'm sorry."

<Carol> Carol sighed and returned the hug gratefully, "That's... why I haven't been around. I went to New York to stay with Hope and Obi because Hope being around made me feel better about Rogue maybe turning up to finish me off... except she wasn't there... so now I guess Rogue is just taking every chance she gets to erode the trust between Tony and me..."

<Carol> "I haven't talked to anyone about this outside of Bobby... no one knows I have all this stuff in my brain on top of my job. Obi knows Rogue threatened me but that's all... I doubt Tony knows. I told Obi about before when Rogue..." she took a shuddering breath and gave Jean a squeeze, "Never told anyone before."

<Jean> "Oooh," she said in revelation. "Maybe Rogue was just trying to scare you? I didn't sense any... malevolence, just hella confusion." She returned the squeeze and tried to project an aura of calm. "Well, I'm glad you told me."

<Carol> "You didn't see what she was like when she threatened me... and she knows that's a no-go area... Jean... when she did that... When she took my memories... it wasn't just all the memories of my childhood I'll never get back... I lost everything. They had to teach me how to function again. You can't make a threat like that and not mean it."

<Jean> "Okay," she sighed with a frown and another squeeze. "It's okay. She has no reason to do it now, right? Just... stay neutral? Like Switzerland? That way she'll just move past it?" Jean really had no idea. She didn't know Rogue that well, other than that Jamie was scared of her. Maybe he had a reason to be.

<Carol> That made her laugh, shaking her head as she released Jean, "Oh no. There's no way she's moving past this. She won't even apologise for going there. Meanwhile I haven't slept properly in weeks and just the idea of being in the same room as her kiiiind of freaks me out."

<Jean> "Well that's understandable." She frowned harder and tried to think. "I know President Stark is kind of the top dog, but is there anyone else you can tell? Nick Fury? Not that giving up your job is ideal but maybe he could transfer you away from her?"

<Carol> "I told Tony I'd go back to DC if it made life easier for him... but he wants me here so... I'm here. At least I have job security?"

<Jean> "Yeah, but he doesn't know the whole story... and can't find out the whole story, because of the crazy." She made an exasperated sound. "This is a mess."

<Carol> "Welcome to my life. It sucks. And I can't even drink."

<Jean> "I can offer some totally legal cannabis?" She offered, giving her a hopeful smile.

<Carol> "Yeah, and I love you for that... but I can't. Military rules."

<Jean> "Well the military has stupid rules then," she nodded.

<Carol> "Frequently," she agreed, "So I'm just drinking a lot of coffee and going to space or Redd's when I feel like Obi needs a break from me because he won't say that he does."

<Jean> "The first daughter picked a shitty time to go on vacation," she said with a sniff.

<Carol> "Oh we are never telling Hope about any of this ever. Never ever." She shook her head slowly, "That would be bad. For the whole world. But mostly Rogue."

<Jean> "Soooo, you're telling me that there's no one to tell, and no one who can help, and so everyone just has to sit back and watch the train wreck?"

<Carol> "Unfortunately that's what we're left with, yep. And then we have to deal with the rage when the injured party finds out we knew the whole time and didn't say anything."

<Jean> Aaand since her and Jamie were just more or less third degree bystanders, that would fall on Carol as well. "I'm sorry. This sucks ass."

<Carol> "Honestly, it's a miracle I'm still sober."

<Jean> She reached for her coffee and held it up. "I'll drink to that."

<Carol> Carol gave a dramatic sigh and picked up her own coffee, "Yay caffeine."

[Esynthia]

Rogue doesn't see Carol as a threat anymore, therefore, no need to follow through on her own threat.

Also, Jamie is totally not cheating by using his powers because he's still putting his own blood, sweat, and almost-tears into the project.