Light A Way

29

Leaning her chin on her crossed arms, which were situated carefully on the edge of the bed, Elsie perked up and looked to the door when it got pushed open. Hank tensed and shot up expecting to get kicked out of the room, instead they were confronted with their friends. Moira led them into the room and tried to look at Elsie and Hank with her best disappointed look. She failed, epically. She couldn't look disappointed at two people who wished to know how their friend was doing. She had been kept rather in the dark too. She knew the basics of what had happened to Charles, but this was the first time she was seeing him. It was sad, seeing someone who was really quite animated to be laying obliviously asleep. Not through wishing to, of course. The doctors had sedated him, not wishing him to wake up so soon after his surgery and insist on moving and leaving.

Managing to scoot over, Elsie patted the arm of the chair. Sean walked over and sat down slowly by her side. With a sigh he fidgeted, this wasn't comfortable, but he'd take it for the sake of being here. "How'd you find her?" Elsie asked, looking up at the redhead perched beside her.

"Actually I found them," Moira replied instead of Sean or Alex, Elsie looked to her curiously. "They were just walking aimlessly around. No one else seemed to notice them until I came out of a meeting and had to whisk them away quickly before they got questioned by the higher ups." She explained while pinching the bridge of her nose. Clearly she had had a rough meeting, and if anyone saw the wandering mutants, things would get worse. Elsie merely nodded at this and returned to leaning against her arms. She blinked slowly and shut her eyes eventually. It was silent in the room then, apart from the steady beeping of the machines close by. "You know you all can't stay here." Moira said heavily. "Yet you can't return to the manor, unsupervised." This choice in word use caused them all to tense and look sharply up at her. "You're being given temporary rooms here, until something is organised for you all."

"Are we being split up? Yes or no? Skimming over the subject isn't really helping us here." Alex said shortly while narrowing his eyes at Moira.

"I don't know." Was her honest reply.

"We will at least be staying near each other?" Elsie asked still with her eyes shut.

"Yes."

"That's so you can supervise us, isn't it?" Her eyes slowly opened then as she looked to Moira.

"It is." The agent replied with a slow nod. "We can't leave you alone, you need some form of supervision." Though she was sure no one was going to break in and try and sway them to take part in something they'd later regret, like Shaw attempted to, but that still didn't mean anything. The last time they were left alone, there was endless property damage, as well as Shaw's appearance.

"Can we visit him whenever we want?" Elsie asked in a slightly desperate tone.

"Within reason, I suppose, yes." Moira said while placing her hands on her hips. "I'm going to be just outside, I'll escort you to your rooms when you come out." She turned and left the room, leaving them all in peace with their friend.

"That's a hint to hurry up, isn't it?" Alex frowned as he looked between each of his friends.

"Yup," Sean said while dragging the word out and popping the 'p' for good measure.

Alex sighed, with a nod he looked from Charles to the door. He was content to know he was as okay as he could be, considering. Turning he walked out of the room, shortly followed by Sean. Hank begrudgingly stood and left too. Elsie sighed and stood up, scratching the back of her neck she leaned down and lightly kissed him on the forehead. "Wake up soon, yeah?" She whispered while even brushing stray brown locks out of his face. With a small sigh she stood up straight and left the room. She shut the door behind her, yet glanced through the gap as it grew smaller at the sleeping figure on the bed.

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"It's like we're back at the beginning." Alex said while looking around the living space they had been escorted into moments ago. The room and space was just like the one from the beginning of this whole adventure.

"I don't like it," Sean said as he sat down on the sofa. "It's like we've just been stuffed in here to be kept out of the way, because they don't actually know what else to do with us."

"I think you've hit the nail on the head there, Sean." Hank said shortly with a frown. Of course no one knew what to do with them. Without one of the people who helped recruit them, they were as good as a wayward group of people with no real purpose.

"Where are you going?" Alex frowned when he caught sight of Elsie moving back over to the door.

"Oh come on...I am not staying here, shut away. I'm bored, I'm restless, I want fresh air. I'm going to the roof, if you wanna come too, come along, if you wanna stay here bored and being watched, fine, have fun." Alex and Sean exchanged a look and shot up to stand either side of her, Hank slowly moved over too. Elsie smiled awkwardly and opened the door, only to come face to face with several guards. They had severely amped their guard duty here.

"Please return to the room."

"Move." Elsie said while narrowing her eyes up at the armed man before her. He didn't reply, which really just irritated her more. "Seriously...move," yet she got nothing from him. Wringing her hands she tilted her head, clicking her wrists she lifted a hand up and placed a finger against the visor the guard was wearing. "I will burn this to your face, if you do not move." Yet the guard remained unflinching. Elsie inhaled deeply, this was going nowhere fast. 

Lowering her hand she ended up fisting it and then full on punching the guard out of the way. Naturally with one guard down the others who accompanied him jumped to restraining them. Tensions were high, each of them were agitated with the day. Everything they had did, they got nothing for it. Not a thank you, not any sort of acknowledgement, nothing. And to top it off, they had all been kept in the dark for hours about the condition of Charles, and then shirked to a room, where they were clearly all meant to stay and not cause trouble. Not causing trouble was something which none of them really had a concept on, so it wasn't surprising that they soon found themselves sitting listening to a lecture from not only Moira, but some other man. It became rather apparent that this man was one of her bosses, not that any of them seemed to particularly care, or listen.

"You know, though we never got to the roof, I found this activity much more rewarding." Alex said while trying the door, he was curious, he wasn't surprised to find the door now locked. After the lecture they'd been bought back to the living space they were being allowed to stay in for now. Sean laughed over Alex's words, Elsie smiled widely, and Hank just shook his head. They had all got involved in the fighting, and really, as mean as it was, punching innocent guards did feel quite good for relieving some stress.
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(Edited: 21/June/2019)

(Reedited: 6/Dec/2021)