11/14 Instance: Just Like Old Times

[Slarti]

Timelined Feb. 15 after Helpfully Unhelpful

<Bobby> Bobby didn't mind coffee, but it really hadn't been his thing. Inspecting the sparkling new coffee machine in the renovated kitchen, he sighed, finding it impossible not to think of her. Especially after what had happened the night before with Paige.

<Victor> Vic, on the other hand, was all for coffee. Coffee was his love, and Rahne had told him in no uncertain terms that he was not getting any kisses until he presented her with a cup. Grumbling to himself, he shouldered the door open - still with 'Staff Kitchen' stuck to it, he noticed - and trudged in, smelling vaguely of minty-fresh kitty from his shower.

<Victor> Flicking the damp end of his tail, he suddenly caught a very recognisable scent, looking up and grinning. "Well now. There's a face I ain' seen in fuckin' years." The London drawl was slightly tempered with Scots now, but it was still very much Vic's.

<Bobby> While his nose certainly didn't give him any warning, Bobby knew that voice and turned in place. "Hooooly shit." A grin slowly spread across his face. "What the hell, dude?! What're you doing here?"

<Victor> Vic ran a hand through his hair. "Oh, y' know, nothin' much, scopin' out a school for the cubs, see if I can steal Fury's thunder..." He grinned. "'Ello, Bobby, long time no see. How the fuck are you?"

<Bobby> "Oh, I'm..." Vic knew his tricks, he remembered. "I'm alive." He nodded, shifting his weight from foot to foot and then huffing in embarrassment. "Bet Fury loves that. I hadn't heard you were back in the states. How's Rahne and the putties?"

<Victor> "Alive's a good startin' point, huh." The grin shifted to his customary smirk. Damn right he knew Bobby's tricks, it'd been long enough. "Yeah, keepin' my head low, this is purely unofficial business. But he's still hatin' me bein' here, cramp his style." He shifted, switching on the coffee machine. Lorna had been one of the casualties, he remembered...shit.

<Victor> "Rahne's here. Putties - I can' believe you still call 'em that - are back home, an' there's enough t' fill a kindergarten." He pulled a face. "Apparen'ly just th' one was a fluke, because the rest came out in litters."

<Bobby> Bobby sputtered. "Holy shit?! How many?"

<Victor> Vic rubbed the back of his head, actually managing to look a little shame-faced. "Uuuh. Eleven. No, wait, twelve. Fuck, tha' sounded bad. Swear, it's good I don't hafta sleep much..." All it had taken was one over-enthusiastic night, one forgetful one and one where Rahne's healing had decided to negate the damned pill.

<Bobby> Well, that had done it. Bobby was speechless. His mouth actually hung open slightly.

<Victor> Vic couldn't help it, he burst out laughing. "Hey, I've been busy, alrigh'? Me and Rahney spent a while gettin' back to bein' friends, we got married and...well...I have a brood. It uh...jus' kinda happened. So." He coughed. "I hear y've gone all military on me too, government-sanctioned heroes?" Totally not changing the subject, nope...

<Bobby> "Yeah... I never saw that coming," he said, shaking himself out of the daze and going to the fridge to look for some sugary caffeinated goodness. "SWORD is... well, it's cool. I mean... since I'm basically... well, what I am... makes sense. I can do stuff to actually make a difference and still manage to come home at night. Be there for Ripley."

<Victor> "Ripley?" Vic looked over to his old roommate. He knew a fair bit about the kids here, but he'd tried to keep his nose out of his old friend's businesses as much as he could - just because he was the head of Britain's own little pet mutants, didn't mean he could use it to know everything. That was just creepy. Even for him.

<Victor> "An' trust me, neither did I. Neither did Rahne...you should see the Christmas shoppin' list. Good job I'm still rollin' in it." He leant back on the side, folding his arms.

<Bobby> Straightening up with a Mountain Dew and kicking the fridge closed, he turned back to Vic. "Oh... yeah, I guess you wouldn't... Ripley's my daughter," he said, cracking the soda open. "Mine and... well... you probably know about Dee..." He licked his lips. "Ripley's a year old... she's here... but with one of the students right now. You'll have to meet her later."

<Victor> "Yeah...I know about Lorna." The look Vic gave him then was sad. Lorna had been a friend, and it still bit that he couldn't have done anything. American soil and act of war his ass...but there was no way they could have reached them in time. "Wow. You wit' a kid...though I ain't surprised you called her Ripley, geek." He grinned again.

<Victor> "Look at us, all grown up wit' kids."

<Bobby> Bobby laughed. "Oh yeah, definitely still a geek... don't know about the grown up part." He just nodded at the mention of Lorna's name. "We should hit the town with something a little stronger than this," he said, lifting his can before taking another sip. "Drink to old friends... lost and found." His smile was faint and sad.

<Bobby> "Oh yeah... and something else you may not know then... Paige came back last year... she's... well, she's still Paige. Been helping me a lot with Rip."

<Victor> "Yeah. We should. Lost too many, found a fair few too." Vic nodded a little, echoing the sad smile as the coffee machine burbled to itself happily. "I'll be stayin' a while, gonna lend a hand in what I can while I'm here too. Officially, I'm on leave, an' my superiors - the few there are - have no clue what I'm up to, but I'm sayin' here and now if there's somethin' I can help wit' in that respect, count me in."

<Victor> He chuckled then. "Paigey? Shit, seems all th' old faces are comin' back. She calmed down any or she still tryin' to paint everythin' pink?"

<Bobby> "Oh, she managed to dye my hair pink again within a week of her return," he laughed, happy to be on more pleasant territory. "You should see the clothes she puts on Ripley." He grinned. "Bet she'd love to get her hands on you, too, furball."

<Bobby> He nodded. "That's awesome, Vic... we need all the help we can get, y'know? I haven't even been that much, honestly... with Ripley and this place in the state it was and... just everything," he paused, clearing his throat. "I've been living on base. Safer. More stable."

<Bobby> "But," he sighed. "This is home... or it should be. With everybody else."

<Victor> "Yeah, she can piss right off, I ain' dyin' my hair pink for no one." Vic grinned at him, before sobering a little at the next words. "An' no one can blame you. But shit'll pick up. SHIELD's lookin' after this place from what I heard, so..." He wasn't going to say it was safer. The X-Men had made a lot of enemies over the years, it was going to bite them in the ass some day.

<Victor> "It'll become home, mate. It always does. One thing they're good at is adaptin' and gettin' over shit." The smile then was a little bitter. "Hell knows we went through enough of it, huh."

<Bobby> "Yeah, a-fucking-men to that." He snorted, staring into the can. "But we definitely need something harder to talk about that." Looking up, he pasted on a grin and jumped up onto the counter. "It's good to have you back, roomie."

<Victor> "Much, much harder. Hard enough t' get me drunk, in fact." Vic sighed, before taking the change and dropping the subject. "Honestly? It's good t' be back." He smirked. "As much as shit changes, it stays th' same, huh - even down to th' kids wit' wings. Keep expectin' there to be another Sabes walkin' about."

<Victor> The coffee machine switched off, and Vic ignored it for now. Rahne would understand. Hopefully. "I missed everyone. Cess has already jumped on me - don' give me that look, not like tha', one woman guy now - an' it even - somehow - smells th' same."

<Bobby> "Oh, that's just the smell of the out of control mutant hormones," he laughed. "That'll never go away." Yeah... he really needed to get back home to the school. He'd have to talk to Paige about it... although that required talking to Paige... after last night. "Cessie glomps are the best glomps," he agreed.

<Bobby> "Have you..." He leaned over on the counter to check the hall for listeners. "Have you seen Anna yet?"

<Victor> "Tentacle glomps." He nodded sagely. "Anna? No...no, I ain' seen her at all. Was kinda hopin' she'd be here actually. Haven' heard anythin' about her for...well, a while." He rubbed a stubbly cheek.

<Bobby> He laughed, picturing Cess' certainly overly enthusiastic reaction. "She comes and goes, like always, but yeah, she's around. I can give you her number, or give her a call myself. She helps me with Rip too..."

<Victor> "That'd be..." He paused. "...Good. So long as she promises t' keep her hands to herself." He grinned, though he was perfectly serious - he didn't need people finding out exactly what his position was, especially people who could remember Black Air and how the British kids had returned from that... "Hell, she could join us on tha' drink, she's always fun to get plastered wit'."

<Bobby> "Hell yeah she is... gloves on or off," he laughed again, dragging his phone from his pocket. Now that he had, he realized he could show Vic his pride and joy, and pulled up a picture of her squeezing the life from Yoda. "That's my dog... Yoda his name is. For, um, obvious reasons."

<Victor> "...Y' have a - holy shit, it is Yoda." He grinned, looking at the picture. "An' they're both gorgeous. Which one's th' kid again?" He chuckled. "I'd show y' mine only...we'd be here all day. Fuck. How'd I end up havin' so many?"

<Bobby> "Oh... you know," he smirked, narrowing eyes playfully at Vic's comment. "Just as well as I do."

<Bobby> Chewing his lip, Bobby took another sip. "Can I ask you a weird question?"

<Victor> "Sure, but my days of wearin' leather an' whippin' people are gone, just so you know." He gave Bobby a grin. "An' yeah, apparently those jokes abou' super-spunk're true, huh."

<Bobby> "Glad I never had to worry about sharing the pool with Howlett then," he chuckled, but the expression quickly faded. "Paige... is sort of living with me," he started, taking a deep breath.

<Victor> Vic chuckled at that, remembering a certain conversation in the pool...god, so many faces missing from back then, the smile fading for a moment before he shook it off. "Yeah?" He raised an eyebrow at his old friend. "I'm guessin' it's a little more'n that if you're bein' awkward about it..."

<Bobby> "It's not," he quickly amended -- too quickly. "Well... it didn't start out that way." Bobby ran his hand through his hair, scratched his stubble, squirmed a little. "And it shouldn't be that way. She... well, she lost somebody too. As, um, crazy as it sounds, she was with Rachel..."

<Victor> "...Holy shit I've missed a lot." Rachel...heh, another name on the list. "Paigey and Rachel? Really?" He leant back on the side, unable to stop the grin at Bobby's awkward squirming but waiting for the guy to explain it. He figured he knew where this was going...

<Bobby> "Yeah... they were together for... well, most of last year. It was a shocker for everybody." His laugh was more than a little forced. "But yeah... me and Paige... we've always been close... but after what happened, she felt safer with me and I felt..." Bobby licked his lips, shaking his head.

<Bobby> "Last night..." he sighed. "I think we've just been too close since... I mean, that has to be it, right?"

<Victor> Vic was proud of the fact he didn't laugh at Bobby's babbling. A few years ago, he might have, but he didn't this time. He did clear his throat, though. "You an' Paigey did th' dirty an' you're feelin' guilty for it an' not sure if you actually feel somethin' for her or if it's a rebound because of...yeah?" He translated, smiling a little. He knew how it felt, after all - Rahne had 'died' at one point.

<Victor> "You an' her have always been good friends. There ain' nothin' wrong with wantin' a little comfort after all that shit, Bobby, hell knows I understand. Maybe it is because of tha' friendship, maybe it's somethin' more, but I can't answer tha' for you, mate."

<Bobby> "We didn't," he sputtered, nearly choking on his Mountain Dew. "It was just... awkward. Lately we've been... yeah, it's just gotten weird." Bobby waved his hand at Vic, brushing some soda off his shirt. "But yeah... you summed up the guilt and the rebound and the ... yeah."

<Bobby> Bobby closed his eyes. "It feels like cheating. Like... like I've already forgotten her."

<Victor> Vic was quiet for a long time, hands on the counter edge. "It ain't." He said quietly. "Y' remember what I was like when Rahne...died, righ'?" He looked up at Bobby then. "As much as it feels like you're betrayin' her, or you're takin' Paige away from Rachel, neither of 'em would want either of you miserable."

<Victor> He breathed out. "But make sure y' know what it is, Bobby. Make sure it ain' just loneliness an' you're clingin' to someone out of desperation. No one deserves tha' shit." He ran a hand through his hair. "An' for what it's worth...I'm sorry. Sorry I couldn' be here an'...done somethin'."

<Bobby> Bobby just nodded. "There's nothing anybody could have done." He blew out a long breath of his own. "Thanks... I mean, I guess I probably know all this, but it's good to hear. I just don't know how I feel. The way she looks at me sometimes... and I feel something too... but I don't know what it is."

<Bobby> "Maybe... it might just be too soon, but on the other hand... why wait? We've been shown over and fucking over just how close to the knife's edge we all are." Bobby made a frustrated sound and chugged his drink.

<Victor> Vic reached out, gripping Bobby's shoulder for a moment. "Yeah. We have. That's why this time I didn' wait when I asked Rahne t' marry me, we went and had it the next week. Don' hesitate, Bobby, but don' rush it either, if you see what I mean." He straightened, smiling a little despite the heavy conversation. "An' yeah. Sometimes you need someone outside to repeat what's in your head. Fuck man, I missed you."

<Bobby> Bobby looked up, reaching to clasp Vic's forearm himself and nod in acknowledgment. "Thanks. I missed you too, man." Then he grinned. "We all gotta get together - just like old times, yeah?"

<Victor> "Just like old times." He grinned back. "We'll even play spin the bottle, migh' actually end up beddin' you." He chuckled to show it was a joke, mostly, before letting go and switching the machine back on. "Until then, wanna come up an' see Rahney? She'll be glad to see y'."

<Bobby> "Suuuuure, just like old times, I still bat for the home team. Sorry, big boy." He laughed, jumping down from the counter to grab another drink. "Hell yes! I can show her a dozen pictures of Ripley to make up for all your putty spawn."

<Victor> "Goddamnit!" Vic laughed. "Hah, an' unlike old times, even if you didn' I wouldn't touch y' mate. One person, one person only now." He smirked, turning the machine back on to reheat. "She'd love it. So many kids, Bobby, so fuckin' many...but I wouldn' change 'em for the world."

[steyn]

A dozen kids..... better have named one Kyle! Need to guest Kyle for at least one instance.