we do it together

Warren had always been curious as to how Scott saw the world, but he never wanted to pry too much. He liked this moment though, and he knows Bobby would have had a lot of fun if he were here. It was weird thinking about their friend in the past tense, but that was their live now wasn’t it? He looks around the room for the lenses. “Everything is red. Well — as if you shaded it red. It’s kind of cool actually.”

Kitty doesn’t hear anything he says, or she does but it’s like she’s listening through a thunderstorm. It doesn’t matter what he says though, nothing would take the guilt away. Bobby was dead, and she was the last thing to touch him. She stares off as he dabs at her bleeding hands, feeling the tightness in her stomach that signals her that she might vomit soon but there’s nothing left inside of her. It’s the pain, she realizes, and she pulls her hands back abruptly. “Ow,” she whispers before her eyes shift to him.

Her head goes to his shoulder then, trying to steady her breathing to keep from upchucking all over them both. Not that it’d matter, they both were a mess. Every time her eyes closed, it played over and over and every time her focus was on the fear in his wide blown eyes. Her shaking, bloody fingers unbutton her top that’s covered in sick and she peels it off. Her tank top beneath is still smudged with blood though, she notices when she pulls back. Without making her intentions known, because she doesn’t know what she’s doing either, she lays down on the shower floor and leans back to stare at the ceiling with her neck on the lip of the tub. “I can’t…” she isn’t sure what she’s going to say, eyes screwing shut as she begins to sob again. Only this time it’s quiet, mostly whimpers like it hurts every time.

Scott wishes for the millionth time in his life he didn’t have to wear these damn glasses. He wants to crush them under his foot and see with his own eyes, not the energy that won’t stop flowing out of them. He watches her move and almost feels like he understands what she means. How could they? How could they keep going without Bobby? He takes off his shirt too and turns the knobs on the opposite side of her to a comfortable temperature. Without saying anything, he climbs into the tub and moves her around so they both fit on opposite sides of each other. Scott’s really tall so it’s not a very comfortable squeeze to keep from touching her too much, but he doesn’t think she minds.

The request isn’t one Warren expects, but he doesn’t question it yet as he shakes the glasses from him. It makes more sense after the addition comment. Bobby always had a way of lightning moods, and making a situation FUN when ordinarily they might not have. “Bobby do that often?” He asks with a smile, talking about good things was always better. He places the glasses on his eyes. “This how you see the world, Scotty?”

“People aren’t always who they say they are. They have… motives.” Reyna shrugs. “Do you know how often people offer favours so that you’re in their debt? So that they can manipulate you?” She sighs. “It’s a lot rarer to have someone be truthful when they say it’s ‘out of the goodness of their hearts’.” Her fingers come up to make airquotes. Scott Summers may see the good in Professor X, but Reyna was still fighting that feeling that any day he’d turn to her and say I let you and your sister stay, I give you a home and food and education, you owe me. “Yeah, you’re telling me…” She shrugs again. “It’s not so bad, actually. Training them. I can do things I didn’t know I could do.”

“You’re right. Bobby wouldn’t want us to be alone in dealing with this.” Warren can’t imagine a mission without hearing one of those ice puns or any joke really. It might take some time to get back out there, but for now he wasn’t even focused on that. “We should all get together, and do something that Bobby enjoyed.” He suggests as it’s a way to celebrate him, and the life he had.

Kitty’s glad Scott doesn’t ask her anything, doesn’t encourage her to speak more. If she did, she might have to throw up again. How did something like that happen? How did he go from smiling one minute to breaking apart beneath her fingertips the next? Still shuddering as he tries to lead her away, she is grateful when he scoops her up. She curls to his body easily, only noticing then how cold she is. Maybe she has been cut deeper than she thought, and the shock kept her from feeling it.

“It’s my fault,” she whispers again, her arms hanging limply around his neck. Her head is tucked just beneath his chin and she can’t really see anything past his opposite shoulder. Her vision is blurred from tears, they make her eyelashes feel stuck together. “I deserve it.” Her voice is resolute when she says it, meaning the cuts covering her arms, face, and chest. 

“It’s not.” It comes out determined and stronger than he meant because Scott feels like his voice could break at any moment. “And you don’t. You were just trying to help.” He adjusts his grip on her to bring her closer to his chest. Bobby was so scared when Scott told him about it. That’s all he can think about, that and the promise that everything would be fine. He lied to his best friend, but none of them deserved this. Especially Bobby.

“This makes it so real, he’s really gone.” Warren knows that casualties happen in this line of work, but Bobby deserved better. He looks over at his best friend finally as the hand is placed on his shoulder. “I don’t know what to do or how we’re meant to go forward. Who’s going to be the comic relief on missions now? It’s not going to be the same, but we have to figure it out, don’t we?”

It was obvious that Warren was crying, but he doesn’t even try to hide it this time. “Hey, I’m making a mess out of myself over here. I’m sorry, I haven’t had the chance to talk to anyone yet.” He had been sitting alone, but he was glad for the company now. He doesn’t want to be left to his thoughts, not after giving that speech. 

“You’ve never thought about that, have you? How creepy that could be?” She knows that the Professor supposedly had ‘good’ intentions but Reyna was not a trusting person. She was still trying to figure out if the Professor had ulterior motives for getting her out of jail time, though none had become apparent. Reyna was going to pick up the cigarette when they moved on, but before that was really an option, Scott was blasting it. She flinches and rolls her eyes. “Overkill,” she mutters. “Uh, yeah, I guess. But are we training for something or just because? Is there a threat coming you know about?” She wants to know if she ought to be prepared; the last attack on the school had been a shock to her.

“No, because I don’t see it that way.” Scott shrugs, “Sure, if the Professor was someone else I might be worried.” It wasn’t hard for Scott to trust their headmaster. Scott believed the professor took care of a lot of people out of the goodness of his heart, he had piles of money for whatever reason and he used it to take care of mutants that couldn’t take care of themselves. It wasn’t hard to see the good in him, at least according to Scott Summers. Looking over at her with an eyebrow raised, he replies, “The original reason for training is so that we can learn how to control our powers, but now we need to be ready for anything. There are too many people in this world that don’t want us here.”

Kitty can feel it, he’s barely holding it together too and she knows he knows. She didn’t have to explain and Scott was too kind to force her to. As he drags her further from the mess she made, she holds tighter to his jacket. He’s holding her so tight she worries she’ll phase right through him but it’s his solidness, both physically and emotionally that keeps her steady. But not even his crushing embrace could erase the images playing over and over in her head. Bobby’s nervous smile, her hand through his body, the bullet in her fingertips. Crash.

She isn’t sure how long it takes before she can speak again, and she sure isn’t ready even then. But she feels like he deserves the truth, before Hank went and made excuses for her. Her head tilts so she can see him and there’s a far off look in her bloodshot eyes. “I took the bullet out and it killed him,” she says hoarsely. “It…” She notices the blood then, not Bobby’s, but her own. Smudged on her skin and staining his shirt and jacket. “He broke, everywhere.”

It’s hard for Scott to hear. It wasn’t detailed, but the way her voice broke explaining how it happened kills him. Bobby wouldn’t have been shot if Scott were just a little faster. The bullet never would have embedded in Bobby’s ice if... if Scott had just used his powers instead. Scott uses a fist to wipe his eyes and when his glasses fall back over them, he looks at her again wishing he didn’t have to wear these stupid things.

Reyna knows that it’ll make her sister happy if she finishes her high school studies, and besides, Scott was right. As much as Reyna would never admit it out loud, having her high school certificate would be helpful if she ever left here. “Do you guys have my transcript too then? Like how you got my medical information? That’s still super creepy,” she replies when Scott talks about classes she doesn’t need. Taking a long drag of the cigarette before dropping it on the ground to stomp it out, she shrugs. “Good, I guess.” She’s closed off without thinking about it, used to keeping her cards close to her chest. And unused to people caring about her. She let people in slowly, one by one, and to have Scott taking this interest suddenly was strange.

“It’s what the Professor does. As an accredited institute, he got your transcripts. Medical records.... I have no idea honestly. Don’t ask me.” Scott never thought of it like that: creepy. The Professor only ever wanted to help, so what was wrong with getting a little paperwork from previous schools or doctors? Sure, with some mutants he comes on strong, but it was easy for Scott because Alex was the one he sought first. When Scott’s mutation manifested, it was the obvious answer to go to the Institute. Scott rolls his eyes when she drops the cigarette, glad she can’t really see, but instead of bending to pick it up and throw it away he just disintegrates it with his own power. Maybe unnecessary, but he wasn’t a fan of littering. “Learn anything new? Are you powers easier to control?” he’s trying to get her to elaborate without forcing it, but it’s difficult when it seems like she doesn’t want to talk to him anymore.

Kitty silently thanks whichever G-d kept her from phasing through Scott then, as he holds her close. She leans on him heavily, sobbing into his collar as her shrieks turn to cries. How does she say it out loud? Would he hate her for what she’s done? She grips his jacket, not thinking about the blood she’s getting on it. She needed something to hold onto.

“I… I didn’t know,” she says like she’s begging, pulling away enough to look up at him. “I didn’t know, I didn’t know it’d happen. I swear, oh my…” She trails off as she leans out of his arms and vomits on the floor beside them. Between what she’d done, and the upset following, her stomach was churning. “Scott… He’s- Bobby is…”

Deep down, Scott knew as soon as he heard her screaming. Scott only needed to see it for himself, but he wasn’t given the opportunity. Staring at the wall, he tries not to break down into a million pieces. Tears form in his eyes, and he shuts them tight to keep them in. “It’s not your fault, whatever happened Kitty, you were just trying to help.”

Kitty hadn’t meant to phase through Hank, or the floor, but she felt stuck in a loop. Like she was still falling, and falling, and Bobby kept cracking and exploding all around her. Pieces of him, in her clothes and hair and in her skin. She just screams and screams, unable to make it stop. It’s all she can do, what else is there to do? There was no undo button, there was no going back and staying her hand. There was no tearing him off the table, there was just batting his remains off of her body and screaming so loud that she was a beacon for Scott to find her.

When she sees him she scrambles towards him, leaving bloody hand prints on the floor as she goes. Reaching for him as her screams turn to shrieks.

Scott falls to his knees in front of her and holds her as she continues shrieking. Whatever happened in there was traumatizing, it wasn’t hard to guess that, so he holds her until she is ready because he doesn’t know what else to do. Pulling her closer, Scott smooths her hair down as tears well up in his eyes. He can only think the worst, especially with blood spatters all over her hands and even tiny cuts on her forearms. When he finally has the courage again, he speaks to try and calm her.

“Kitty!” he could hear her screaming when he rounded another corner. She needed him, she couldn’t be alone right now and he needed to help her. Somehow...

Bobby worries his bottom lip between his teeth, he waits for the other to text back so he can respond before finally putting his phone away. The three little dots take almost forever and a half to actually stop moving and for the message to come through and it’s a relief. 

[ text : Scoots ] : Yeah, of course, shouldn’t take too long. I’ll be out in a jif! Thanks bro, thanks for looking out!

When Scott gets there, he stops outside the door he’s pretty sure is the right one. Despite being confident Bobby will make it through the surgery, he can’t shake a sinking feeling within himself. Scott waits outside patiently, just scrolling through his phone, while they do whatever it is they needed to do inside the surgery room. He texts Bobby again, just for him to see when they are done.

Bobby’s just climbed up onto the lab table when his phone buzzes. He’s nervous, super nervous about all of this but he’s trying to put on a brave face for Kitty and Hank. He doesn’t know what’s going to happen, but he does know that he’s going to be the one to convince them this is the right course of action. He had to be sure, because neither of them were. It was a risk, but one he was willing to go for.

That’s when he takes a breather to text Scott back having read his message before the procedure. 

[ text : Scoots ] : Oh hey Scoots! Just uh, about to go under the knife actually. Not actually, but I’m down in the lab. Kitty’s removing the bullet for me. I think I should be done here pretty quick, but Hank might keep me here for observation. Dunno. What’s up?

Scott adjusts his glasses after reading the text, he’s a little nervous now that he knows where Bobby is. He starts heading that way wondering why on Earth they would schedule the procedure on his birthday. After shoving the present under his arm, he texts Bobby back using two hands this time, more because of his feeling of urgency rather than anything else.