12280/Hot Cocoa Cures All

Hot Cocoa Cures All
Date of Scene:	02 October 2020
Location:	Shannon's Room (East Halls), Xavier's School
Synopsis:	Tabitha checks in on Shannon after the incident post-Jazz Night. The two share a bit more of their respective stories, as well as hot cocoa and cookies made by Tabitha.
Cast of Characters:	Siphon, Nightingale

---

Siphon has posed:
    She barely remembers the trip back from Manhattan to the Institute. She couldn't even rightly say if they were driven or flown for the trip. Tabitha didn't really come to until she found herself being poked, prodded, and getting a penlight shone into her eyes... and having them reflect nothing because the light was just getting slurpped up by her aura. After accepting that she wasn't injured, just wet, filthy, and uncomfortable she was sent up to her room to get cleaned up.

    It was in the scalding hot shower that the shaking started. And stopped. And started again. Her skin was still solid copper and glowing. Her aura refused to shut down. She went down to the kitchen and rummaged around. Surely a place like this had the ingredients for proper hot chocolate? While it bubbled away on the stove it really hit her. She hadn't been in a fight, those were nothing new. This had been a battle. And that's when she remembered the blood, and whose it had been.

    So she put everything: massive kettle of hot chocolate, mugs, cookies, and (cloth!) napkins onto a cart and brought them up to Shannon's room. She knocks softly, hoping not to disturb if Shannon was already asleep.

Nightingale has posed:
     Battle was nothing new to Shannon by now. It wasn't her first time in the field, and was unlikely to be her last. Thinking back to how everyone had handled themselves, she couldn't be one bit prouder. Alice had done incredibly well helping escort the residents of that apartment complex to safety, and Tabitha? She'd heard a hint of the girl's past from her during their conversation in the kitchen, and had been worried about her. But in the end, she too had performed admirably. For her own part, she might have bucked the first order she was given, but in the end, didn't do too badly.

     If one can count another trip to the medbay as 'not too badly'.

     She's just unplugging her electric teakettle, which is steaming away, when she hears the knock at the door. Her footfall is a bit slower than usual, but still, she does answer the door, dressed in her favorite pink satin two-piece pajamas, and barefoot for once. "Tabitha! There you are, I was worried about you! Come on in!"

Siphon has posed:
    Tabitha is also barefoot but is otherwise in the double layered colorless flanel nightshirts and sweatpants that are her PJs, but no hat this time. Everywhere the PJs don't cover is liquid copper skin glowing almost enough to read by. Even her hair has a slight luminesense. Not her eyes. Her eyes are a total absense of light, and the glow everywhere else flows towards them to vanish.

    She smiles with relief as Shannon opens the door, and then gives her a LOOK while entering the room with the hot chocolate cart. "You were worried about ME? I'm not the one who came home with a gut wound! Should you even be walking?!"

Nightingale has posed:
     At that, Shannon just laughs, although as she does the motion does cause her to wince just a bit. "Yeah. Your first time in a situation like that. My first didn't go nearly as well, so I was real concerned how you were holding up. But I was under orders to rest up in here."

     Stepping back from the door, she makes for the seating area near the fireplace, almost reaching up to help Tabitha move the cart inside, but winces. "Oof. Maybe I'd better let you do that this time."

Siphon has posed:
    "Damn right, you're letting me do that!" Tabitha swats at Shannon's hands. Blows that land are light, like getting tapped with a beanbag as the kinetic energy is slurpped up by her aura. "Sit your butt down, Little Miss Invalid!" Yes, she is calling someone else little. Deal with it. She brushes off the remark about how she's doing herself. She's on a roll and doesn't want it to stop just yet.

    She carefully and conscientiously puts her hands into oven mitts and then further uses pot holders to pick up the steaming kettle she's brought and fill up the two mugs, each one about half the size of her own head.

    "Drink this. Or just hold it and breathe it in. What's that in your kettle?" She asks this as she only just noticed that Shannon had one of her own at the ready.

Nightingale has posed:
     Opening her mouth to reply for just a moment, Shannon simply closes it again, shaking her head. "Holy hell's bells. When did I wind up with a twin?" Though she does manage to smile, settling into one of the chairs by the fireplace, her wings extended out to the sides and over the arms of the chair. Accepting the cup of dark, chocolatey goodness, she takes a sip--and looks as if she's in heaven. "Just some hot water in the kettle. Xiomara came by, I made some cocoa for her. But it was the mix stuff. This tastes like you made it from scratch."

Siphon has posed:
    Tabitha snorts softly, "Twin? You should be so lucky. I'm cute as fuck!" Her expression softens as she watches Shannon drink. Only then does she climb up into another chair and take hold of her own mug. That she's still using oven mitts to hold. And has a pink twirly straw.
    "I did make it from scratch. The pantry here is delightfully well stocked." She sucks down a drink through the straw, taking about half a second to savor and swallow before it loses all the hot. "Luxuries were few and far between back at the Big House, but this was one of them." She seems to run out of her own steam at this point, lapsing into silence.

Nightingale has posed:
     "Oh please, you should be the lucky one. I'm gorgeous!" Grinning over the rim of her mug, Shannon takes a little sip, sighing very lightly with pure enjoyment. "So I suppose that makes us both gorgeous, and both cute as fuck." She smiles some, and lapses into silence for a few moments as well. "You're also far braver than I was my first time out in the field. That still haunts me to this day."

     Listening to Tabitha's time in the orphanage, her brows furrow. It's all she can do to not just pull her into a hug right then and there--but she's not too keen on risking a chewing-out. "It's the simple joys shared that make hard times worth going through, and good times that much better. But I can't even begin to imagine what things were like for you. I've been very fortunate, having my folks."

Siphon has posed:
    With a mock serious expression which is completely ruined by the pink twirly straw and condensation on her forehead, Tabitha nods. "I suppose we both must be all of that, then." She shrugs about the orphanage, "It wasn't bad, it was just... there. Days were more or less all the same. It wasn't really geared toward having anyone live there for as long as I have."

    The compliment about her performance causes her to look downward at her feet dangling over the floor. "I think I threw up in the med clinic sink. And I know I couldn't even stand up in the shower. I just kept thinking about everything. Like how the fuck is this normal around here? I had barely had time to unwrap learninga bout mutants, being one, and going to a school full. And now I'm scared about just why the school has such a well stocked med clinic!"

Nightingale has posed:
     Shannon nods slowly. sipping the hot cocoa and thinking. "My first time in the field, it was a mutant rights rally that went south when some Sentinels show up." Pausing, she frowns a bit. "Not sure if you've heard of those. If not, you're lucky. Basically, they're big mutant-hunting robots. Anyways, one took a potshot and killed one of the people attending. He wasn't a student here, just a kid about our age, named Daniel. Call went out to tend the wounded, but by the time I got there it was already too late. He'd gotten shot in the back, and... it wasn't pretty. I still have nightmares about it sometimes. Had a lot of folks help me through it. Sam... Logan... Cap. I see someone get thrown into a rough situation like that, I just want to be there for them, too, like everyone was for me."

Siphon has posed:
    Tabitha shakes her head when asked if she knows about Sentinels. She has a passing thought about how 'What's that?' is likely to be her catchphrase, but it's gone as quick as it arrives while she listens to Shannon talk about this.

    "Well you've already been there for me, and I've only just arrived." She takes a moment to top off both of their mugs after giving the kettle a stir, then hops back into her chair.

    "For me it's just that as a kid I was always the target. The only real Other in the town. So as I got older I just went with it. Why let anyone hurt the other orphans when I could just give them me as a better target? Eventually that's all I was to everyone outside the Big House. The target."

    "That's what was going through my head tonight, I think. That truth about being a better target than whoever else was there."

Nightingale has posed:
     "We're more than just targets, though. You're much more than that. But that's something you've got to see for yourself. Maybe here, you'll have that chance to find out what else you can be." Shannon smiles a little bit wider, chuckling. "Can't wait for Miss Grey to get back from her sabbatical. You'll love meeting her. She's the headmistress here, and let me tell you, she's a total sweetheart. She'd probably tell you that you're much more than just a target, too."

     Lifting her mug in salute to Tabitha, Shannon just inhales the rich, sweet aroma of the drink, letting the warmth seep into her hands. "I think you're going to find that you went from having no family, to a very big one here. In the end, that's what we try to be to each other."

Siphon has posed:
    "That would be nice." For a moment Tabitha lets herself entertain that thought. Family. It's a word she lets into her mind once or twice a year before relegating it to the category of 'Unutterables'.

    "I think I should maybe get to know the staff here a bit more, for certain." She holds her legs up, wiggling the liquid copper toes. "Especially any of them that can maybe explain to me just what the actual hell is going on with this. I mean, I kinda dig the color. Almost anything's better than making cottage cheese look dark."

Nightingale has posed:
     Shannon giggles softly. "Shame you didn't get here this summer, we could've had you working on your tan out by the pool. No more cottage cheese!" As she continues on talking with Tabitha, she can't help smiling to herself. A new friend was always a blessing. Perhaps they had both been blessed, more than either knew.