(no subject)

[un_gloved]

Rogue's room had the air of one that was unlived in. It had been almost half a year since she'd begun sleeping at other people's places. Mostly Spike's, a few times Wolverine's, but almost never in a room alone. She spent time her in her room, and kept things there, but it didn't feel the way it had when it had been constantly a mess and fully hers.

That kind of thing seemed to be going around. At least, her room wasn't the only thing that felt half-alien and unfamiliar.

After more than two hours of not moving, Rogue's eyelids twitched. Her lashes fluttered open and she took in the room with a calm, steady gaze. Not sedated- not any more- although a certain lethargy clung to her initial movements, turning her head and and shifting against the mattress, pushing herself up on her elbows and frowning a little as her head fell forward, heavy.

"Mnh."

Comments

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"Kind of a big question," Spike says, with a slight smile. "The short term version is I heard, came down. Here you were, right where the doc left you."

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

Her own lips twitched unsuccessfully toward smiling. She let her head drop to the pillow again and curled a hand tightly into the fabric of it.

"Lie down with me?"

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"Hardly an offer you turn down," Spike says, tilting his head and watching her for a moment before he does cross to the bed. And even then, he doesn't immediately lie down, sitting for a moment on the edge.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

She didn't call him on it, just snuck a hand immediately across the space between them to curl her fingers against the fabric of his slacks. She curled in on herself slightly.

"So Ah'm gonna guess," she started, gingerly, eyes on the place her knuckles disappeared into a crease of fabric, "that Ah did somethin' constitutes 'crazy'."

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"That's what I hear," Spike says, laying his hand on hers and turning to look down at her. "Don't know all the details. Taste of my own medicine, huh?"

Something crazy, something vague.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

She closed her eyes and nodded slightly.

"Could do with a lesser dose, myself. No one told you anything?" She looked up at him, concerned- not for Spike, he was a big boy, could take care of himself- but if she'd been sedated, and the throbbing in her head told her she had been, then whatever happened must have been pretty extreme.

She needed to know what the damage was.

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"Doc looked like he had too good a grip on your medical records for me to lift 'em," Spike says. This was, of course, an entirely reasonable way of getting information, since he'd seemed like one of those responsible doctors that you can't trade information for beer with. "There was some trouble in a bathroom, Doc knocked you out. Him and LeBeau brought you down here."

Spot the important part of that sentence.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

Her eyes, perfectly round, snapped up and locked on Spike's profile. She froze. After a moment, her eyebrows knitted together and she glowered more worriedly than ever at the bedspread.

"...oh."

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"I could've asked him, but it didn't really seem my place," Spike says, which is skirting the issue a little.

But then, meeting things head on isn't ultimately his way. Even in a fight -- especially in a fight -- it's about dancing around it.

There are elements of this current issue that are not unlike a fight.

Some of them might even end up being a straight-up throwdown.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

"I don't- Oh, God, I can't remember," she said, frustration rushing her words at the end. She closed her eyes tightly and tried to wade through the mess.

"This is-" She almost laughed.

"This is almost worse'n I could've expected. Don't know why 'm surprised, though."

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

Can't remember. Shades of the same problems, the same conversations. That one, he is used to being on this side of, he's just not used to caring. Faye's memories never mattered. It wasn't relevant to anything, even if it the only thing that could convince her of that was getting the useless things back.

"Hey," Spike says, "at least it's only almost. Almost worse than you expect can be a step up."

It's one way of looking at it, at least.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

"Uncharacteristically optimistic of you," she said quietly.

"Not that I don't appreciate it." She looked up at him and curled both of her arms up to pillow her cheek on them.

"....I was really hopin' it would just... this would go away, that it wouldn't get like this."

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"I like to surprise people," Spike says, lying down and stretching out, just beside the curl of her arms. "Hoping you'd just wake up fixed, huh?"

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

"Stupid, huh?" she whispered.

"Guess 'mm just a cock eyed optimist when it comes down to it. Oh, Lordy, Emma's gonna have a field day with this." She dug the heel of her pal against her eyelid.

"Except she won't be able t'do anything about it. Oh, God, 's gonna get worse."

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

Spike doesn't say anything immediately to this; he doesn't have anything. He's hardly an expert in fixing broken mindscapes. His particular issue, troublesome as it has been, at least does not get worse.

"Has to be something," Spike says. "There's a way out of anything."

The problem is, sometimes that way is dying. This is not an option he prefers.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

"Outta your own head?" she said. She reached over enough to rest her fingers against his arm.

"I don't know how this is gonna go, Spike."

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"Least it's not boring, then," Spike says, lifting his eyebrows. Looking a little rueful, all the same. This is far from the fun variety of being out of his depth.

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

She met his look with a mildly disapproving one of her own, but there wasn't a lot behind it. It was just dismaying to think about.

"...Spike...." She frowned, but didn't direct it at him.

"This is somethin' out of my control. I used t'have tricks t'deal with it, 'n there was always a safety net but here, it... There's no tellin'-" She pressed her lips together in a line.

[dreaming-cowboy.livejournal.com]

"What you're going to do?" Spike says, reaching out to push some of her hair back, idly holding the white lock between two fingers for a moment. "Rogue, I couldn't work that out before, either."

[un-gloved.livejournal.com]

She almost smiled but just ended up biting her lips together to stop from doing anything more.

"But it's not me who'll be doin' it," she said. "I don't know who it will be, come to that. But some of the folks in here are nasty pieces o'work, 'n they'll... If I can't control 'em..." She looked past Spike to the wall.

"I don't know. I don't know, Ah just. Don't know."