I can't afford a
Midnight snack, so please don't sue.
Marvel owns, not me.
Note: This takes place after "Under Lock & Key", and I wrote it because I watched "Cauldron" and "Walk on the Wild Side" again, meaning disparate plot elements are drawn from both of the latter. (Wow, I almost sound like I know stuff.)
Cookies and milk at midnight was an old tradition for Scott and Jean. It had started from almost their first night in the Institute; both of them had suffered from sleeplessness in those days, albeit for different reasons. Jean wasn't used to the absence of others' thoughts, the absence of hospital noises, and the absence of the sedative courses her doctors had prescribed. Scott just had insomnia, plain and simple. He still did, but it occurred less frequently now - when there was a major exam on the horizon, for instance. And on rare nights, she still woke up in the middle of the night expecting to find a straitjacket wrapped around her, but on the whole, those old troubles were gone.
Replaced, of course, by new troubles. As all things were.
Ororo was therefore not surprised when she came in at almost midnight to find them in the kitchen with a half-eaten bag of chocolate-chip cookies, a carton of milk, and two empty glasses in front of them. The only thing about the tableau that was any different from prior nights was the fact that, instead of sitting across from each other, they were side-by-side, and Jean was leaning on Scott's shoulder.
"Good evening," Ororo said, crossing the tiled floor and opening the refrigerator. The tiles were cool under her feet; the metal door cool under her fingers. It was a pleasant contrast to the humidity of the outdoors. She had so few chances to fly without notice, and most of those were after dark. The moon was riding high tonight, and a natural storm was brewing. A perfect night to soar in the clouds, and well worth the loss of sleep. "Or should I say 'good morning'. You're up late."
"We had a nightmare," Jean said, twisting around in her chair to meet Ororo's eyes. It was a plain explanation, with no humor underlying - just the truth. They'd had a nightmare. Together. Very simple. Ororo suppressed a smile. Their psychic link bothered no one, it seemed, except the adults.
Ororo did not see anything she wanted in the fridge, so she took a glass from the cabinet and sat down across from Scott and Jean, confident that they would not let the milk stand out long enough to sour. The milk was indeed still cold, and she filled her glass halfway. "A nightmare? About what?"
Scott lifted his head to meet her eyes as well. Light glinted on his sunglasses and on Jean's hair. Red twice over. "Asteroid M."
"I don't believe I've heard that one," Ororo said calmly, as though it was a child's fairy story they were speaking of. Ordinarily, she wouldn't pry, but the adults had standing orders from the professor: Until they learned more about the psychic link, they were to closely monitor every aspect. One of those aspects was shared dreams.
It turned out that the psychic link was mostly unused during the daylight hours. It was background noise to Jean; Scott had to concentrate to pick up on it at all. Charles and Hank had done several experiments regarding that, including placing Jean in Cerebro, where the psi-shielding would prevent those outside from touching the minds of those inside. The moment the door shut, Scott had startled and said, "It's gone." For him, it seemed, the psychic link was only noticeable by its absence.
At night, however, it came alive. The tenuous threads that bound their conscious minds were connected far more deeply on a subconscious level. This was not the first time they'd been discovered to have shared a dream. Even when they didn't, Jean reported feeling his presence, and Scott hers.
Charles found it faintly worrisome. Hank delighted in the puzzle of it all. Ororo was too busy enjoying the blossoming romance. She had always loved to watch her plants flourish - and what were children but seeds yet to grow?
These particular seeds did not look tired, despite the late hour. The sugar from half a bag of cookies no doubt went a long way towards alleviating their fatigue. Nevertheless, a shadow of something crossed over their faces at Ororo's request, making them appear momentarily exhausted.
"It's, uh, kind of hard to explain," Scott said, picking up the glass and turning it around between his fingers.
Jean pulled away from him and fingered her hair, a nervous habit Ororo well recognized. "It was more of a feeling than anything else."
"I see." Ororo sipped her milk and waited. She remembered Asteroid M. The exact details of Scott and Jean's experiences there weren't familiar to her, but she had a general idea. Like Scott talking Jean down during her power surge - which Ororo had not been present for - some things filtered into the Institute's common knowledge.
"So it was my dream first," Jean said, the words spilling out. "Or maybe it was his dream and it jumped into mine. We're not sure."
Ororo nodded slightly, encouraging.
"We were on Asteroid M," Scott said. He was still playing with the glass, and no longer meeting Ororo's eyes. "And it was falling apart, just like it did for real - only we couldn't get away."
"And it was my fault," Jean said softly.
"No it wasn't," he said, the correction swift and sharp, as though it had actually happened. For them, Ororo realized, it had. To them was as real as any mission they'd undertaken on the physical realm - they had both been there, and they had each other's memories to back it up. Was that what was it like, to dream in tandem?
Jean's demeanor shifted almost before the words were spoken. She took rebukes about as well as Scott himself did - which was to say, not very well at all. Having worked and lived with the two children as long as she had, Ororo knew the tempers that lurked behind their usual polite behavior. And no one could press Jean's buttons as well as Scott - and vice versa.
"How did the dream end?" Ororo put in, steering the focus back with the ease of long practice, and was gratified to see the flash of anger between them vanish.
Scott shrugged and set the glass on the table. Somewhat flatly, he said, "It blew up."
Jean laced her arms through his and rested her head on his shoulder again. "We woke up before it did."
"What made you think of it?" She deliberately kept her gaze on her own glass, not wanting to make assumptions on whose dream it really was. "Asteroid M was destroyed a long time ago."
There was a moment of silence that stretched out to the point of discomfort. Then Jean said, "We don't know."
"We" again. Ororo made a note to ask Charles if that was healthy. She doubted it. She also doubted that it was the truth, which was borne out by the next comment.
"Maybe it's all this business with Magneto," Scott said. He still wasn't looking at Ororo. "Working with him or whatever."
Ororo thought that highly likely. "Perhaps."
Another moment of silence. This one ended with Jean and Scott standing, exchanging a few words of good night with Ororo, and walking quietly out of the kitchen. They'd remembered, of course, to put away their glasses before they went, although they left the cookies and milk out.
Ororo remained seated, sipping her milk and thinking. She didn't touch the cookies. Junk food held little appeal for her, although she did enjoy its visual equivalent of television.
"Up late," someone said from the door, echoing her earlier words. Ororo glanced up from the rim of her glass.
"Hello, Logan. It's a good night for flying."
"Not with those thunderheads rolling in. Your doing?" She shook her head and he gestured at the cookies. "Scott and Jean again."
"Yes. They had a nightmare." She watched him rummage through the refrigerator. "That makes two in the space of five days."
"I know. I caught the last one in progress." His back was to her, but she heard the dislike in his voice. Logan was not anyone's first candidate for providing a calming presence - himself included. "Which one was it tonight?"
"Asteroid M."
He paused, lifting his head as if searching the air for memories. "Oh yeah. The one where they're trapped and Scott can't get them out."
That was interesting. She tilted her head to one side, eyes narrowing in unconscious reevaluation. Another thing to ask Charles about in the morning. "Yes, but it was Jean this time."
He shook his head at that and went back to rummaging. Foraging was perhaps a better descriptor, given his nature. "Least they're sharing," he muttered, barely audible over the clink of glassware and plastic.
She took another sip of her milk. "This relationship could cause trouble."
Logan found something at last and shut the refrigerator door with an air of finality. "Not as much as Jeannie dating that football player."
Ororo smiled but said nothing. Outside, the storm was gathering strength. She felt more than heard a faint rumble of thunder; it wouldn't be long before the rain began.
Unlike her, Logan had no compunctions about consuming junk. He leaned against the counter with a pack of sliced bologna and started to eat it cold. "Seriously, Ororo. You're not worried about them, are you?"
"They are still very young," she pointed out.
He snorted. "They're gonna get married, have two-point-five kids, and be together 'til the day they die."
She was amused and made no attempt to hide it. "So now you are precognitive as well?"
"Nah, but I know them. I watched them grow up," he said, throwing the rest of the meat back into the fridge. He turned back to face her, pointing one finger at her for emphasis. "You did too."
The storm had nearly reached fruition. Ororo felt the rain swelling and the lightning crackle high in the atmosphere, riding the coming downpour with her outstretched mutant senses. She wondered if the storm inside had abated, then chastised herself. It had never been a storm in the first place. It had been a dream, and it had been chased away by cookies and milk.
With that thought, she let her smile widen. "Which is why I agree with you."
He grinned - a predatory expression even in good humor, as it was now - and leaned across the table, snagging the bag of cookies with one hand before heading out of the kitchen. "If I don't eat 'em, the elf will, and he doesn't need that kind of sugar," he said over his shoulder, by way of explanation.
"Good night, Logan," she called after him.
"Night, 'Ro," came back, muffled by the wall and the distance he had already traveled down the hallway.
She sat for a while longer as the storm lashed the Institute. Without checking the forecast, she could tell that it was going to last for all the night and well into the morning. The students would complain about going to school in the rain, but she already knew that she would do nothing. She never did unless she had to. Nature's patterns were not to be warped for frivolous reasons, and as a teacher, she had to set an example for her children. A few of whom were fast approaching adulthood themselves.
Ororo wondered if Scott and Jean would still sit at midnight with milk and cookies when they were running the school - when they had a nightmare, or Jean woke up in remembered panic, or Scott was worrying about something beyond his control.
She hoped they would. Some things shouldn't change.
Ororo finished her milk, rinsed out her glass and returned the carton to the refrigerator, then climbed to her attic room and slept with the rain singing of the future in her dreams.