(no subject)

[notsogroovy]

The dreams had started after Darwin. The night after, in fact, and she was glad that her room was away from most of the guest quarters and that Charles usually didn't go to sleep until late. He wouldn't hear her dreams and neither would anyone else. It started with Darwin, of course. She got to watch him die all over again. It didn't stop there, though. Next was Sean and Alex. Hank and Erik. It was usually around the time they got to Charles that she started screaming. The screams woke her almost immediately and she waited desperately until she knew that no one had heard or, at least, no one was admitting to having heard her screams.

Tonight was similar. This time, she'd woken up to the image of Hank's body contorted on the ground after having been dropped to the ground from a hundred feet up. She sat up in bed, stared at the door, and panted. She waited, hoping that no one had heard her. Of course not. Why should it be any different tonight than it had any other night?

Except then she heard a distinctive creak on the floorboards and froze.

Comments

[wegoyougo.livejournal.com]

Hank had spent another late night in the lab and was only now heading back to his room to go to bed when a scream from Raven's room stopped him in his tracks. His first thought was that they'd been found, Shaw had somehow sought out Charles's mansion and was here now to kill them all.

Without thinking – and certainly without knocking – he burst through the door with a panicked, "Raven!"

The room was dark but enough light from the hallway shone in, illuminating ... Raven, sitting in her bed. There was no Azazel, no Riptide. Just Raven.

"Oh." A slow blush crept into his cheeks. "I'm sorry. I... I thought.. um. I'll just... leave you. Sorry."

[notsogroovy]

"Hank!" Raven shifted quickly so that she was back to her blonde self almost before he could realize she'd been blue at all. She also added a tank top and pajama bottoms just to be on the safe side. Her fists curled into the sheets when she mentioned leaving.

"No," she said quickly. She sounded desperate. She didn't want him to go. "Please, could you...stay? For a few minutes. I had a nightmare. I dreamed..." She trailed off. He could imagine what she had dreamed.

A MONTH LATER.

[wegoyougo.livejournal.com]

Meanwhile, Hank was too busy making a fumbling attempt to exit the room to notice that Raven had been blue. But when she called out to him and he heard that desperation in her voice, he stopped and looked at her.

"Are you sure you need me to stay?" His brow furrowed. It wasn't that he didn't want to. It was just... well...Ok. So he didn't really have an excuse, and found himself wandering to her bedside and taking a careful seat at the edge despite his hesitant words. "It was only a dream, Raven. It wasn't real."

He was trying to be comforting. Really, he was. It just wasn't exactly coming out as soothing as he'd planned.

Re: A MONTH LATER.

[notsogroovy]

Raven deflated a little. Need, not want. Was she sure she needed him. The truth was that no, she probably didn't need him. In fact, she was sure she didn't need him just like she was sure she didn't need anyone save, maybe, Charles. Needing, however, wasn't the same as wanting and she was sure that she wanted him there.

She tried to hide the disappointment in her face, bus she couldn't quite hide it in her voice as she said, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to...I'm probably keeping you up. It's all right. You don't have to babysit me."

[wegoyougo.livejournal.com]

"No, it's okay," Hank replied hastily. "I want to stay. I didn't mean to sound like I didn't. Sorry." He shifted uncomfortably on the bed, frowning a little. This shouldn't be that awkward after all the time he and Raven had spent together. He had a remarkable talent for making things so, though, and this time was no different.

Nevertheless, after a moment he managed to ask, "Do you want to talk about it?"

[notsogroovy]

Raven just shook her head. "What's there to talk about? The last few weeks I've had my life turned upside down. I thought...thought we were alone in all this. Me and Charles. And then I meet everyone. I meet you." She ducked her head and couldn't quite meet his eyes. He was special, even if he couldn't quite figure out what it was he wanted.

"And with everything that happened before coming here...I'm surprise we're all not having nightmares."

[wegoyougo.livejournal.com]

Hank nodded slowly. He understood where she was coming from, he really did. The events leading up to their time in the mansion had been weighing heavily on his mind, even if he didn't always show it. Sometimes when he was in his lab his mind would begin to stray from his work and he'd begin to dwell on that man, Azazel, and how easily he'd slaughtered those agents. It had been a horrifying night that Hank wouldn't soon forget.

"I think," he began slowly, not quite willing to share his own feelings on the matter quite so openly but wanting to talk nonetheless, "I think we all have our own ways of dealing with what happened. The... the trauma – it manifests differently for everyone, right? Not everyone has nightmares."

[notsogroovy]

"Maybe not," Raven agreed. She was sure that Charles didn't. He was just likely to overthink everything and try to puzzle out where he'd gone wrong even though she wasn't sure he could have done anything else.

She looked down for a minute and then scooted closer so that she could lean in and press a kiss to his cheek. At least, it was supposed to be his cheek. The kiss ended up nearer to the corner of his mouth than his cheek. Maybe it was an accident, but she didn't really mind.

"Thank you. For staying with me. I appreciate it."

[wegoyougo]

Oh. Hank hadn't been expecting a kiss – though perhaps he should have – and the gesture, however quick that it was, brought a tinge of pink to his cheeks as he gave an awkward, breathy chuckle. He would've kissed her back if he'd had a chance but now that she'd pulled back he seemed content to smile at her instead.

"It's nothing, really," he shrugged off her apology. "Do you want me to stay until you fall asleep again?"

[notsogroovy]

Raven considered that. On the one hand, he'd be in her bed. On the other...he'd be in her bed. That thought definitely appealed to her and she slid over, patting the bed next to her. Even if he hadn't intended to stay in the bed, she was offering it to him. "Yeah, I think I'd like that. As long as you don't mind. I don't like keeping you up."

The idea of curling up next to him and maybe using his chest as a pillow was really an appealing one.

[wegoyougo]

Hank hesitated for only a moment – surprising as that may be – before he toed off his shoes and crawled onto the bed, laying down next to Raven. His heart was beating furiously in his chest, betraying how nervous he was, but he tried (keyword: tried) to play it cool.

"Don't worry about keeping me up. It's fine, really. I don't mind," he had said as he settled into place.

[notsogroovy]

Raven shifted a little closer and then a little closer still until her head was resting against his shoulder. "Thank you," she whispered. It did feel better having someone there and she wasn't sure if she wanted to ask Charles to come or not. She was half-afraid that if she'd gone to him, she would have been walking in on him and Moira and there were just some things that she couldn't unsee.

Having Hank here was nice, though, it was good. Even if she did have butterflies in her stomach.

[wegoyougo]

Aaaand Hank was trying not to die of nerves or do anything weird or move too much. This resulted in him pretty much laying there like a big plank of wood at first, completely unmoving. "Y-you're welcome," he managed to spit out.

Eventually, in between thoughts of "I'MINRAVEN'SBED" and "WHATAMIDOINGOHGOD", he relaxed a little bit and brought his hand up to stroke her hair softly and affectionately. This was nice; he couldn't lie about that.

[notsogroovy]

Raven took that as permission - or at least the opportunity - to slide in a little closer and wrap her arm around his stomach. She closed her eyes and sighed. The sigh felt like all the tension in her body was leaving in that one breath and she stretched her body to revel in the feeling.

"Feels nice," she murmured. She turned her head and lifted heavy eyelids to look at him.

[wegoyougo]

"Y-yeah," Hank replied. "It does." Despite the mild stammer, he actually was feeling much better now. A bit bold, in fact. He wanted to kiss her, but hesitated if only because he wasn't sure if the time was entirely right - he wasn't very good at judging that sort of thing. Then again, a kiss hadn't seemed appropriate when he was taking her blood, and they had almost shared one then. Hm.

"You should have told me you were having nightmares earlier. I would've stayed with you every night," he decided to say in a weak effort to sort of gauge her attitude towards the situation. She had never given him reason to doubt that she liked him, yet he required confirmation all the same. Romance was far too new to him.

[notsogroovy]

"I didn't want to worry you. Any of you. I guess I thought...I don't know." She knew exactly what it was. She didn't want to be the weak one. She didn't want to be the one who couldn't handle what everyone else seemed to be able to. Maybe it was only in her head, but she wanted Hank, Erik, Charles especially, she wanted them to look at her like she wasn't just some kid they had to take care of.

She did smile a little when Hank mentioned staying with her. "You'd do that?"

[wegoyougo]

"Of course I would," Hank answered. "And you shouldn't be so concerned about making the rest of us worry. It's okay to ask for help, you know."

Come to think of it, that was something everyone on the team could learn. Perhaps they'd all been on their own for so long, isolated due to their differences, that asking for help just didn't come naturally anymore. Alex's teasing even made it hard for Hank to feel like he fit in among his own kind. Maybe Raven was the same way?

"You can ask me for help anytime."

[notsogroovy]

Raven smiled weakly. "It's just been me and Charles for almost as long as I can remember. I'm not used to having anyone else. And Charles..." She shook her head. "He gets lost in his own problems sometimes." Right now, his problems were all of them and what was going to happen in the future. Who was she to add a few nightmares on top of that?

"I don't want to be a burden. To Charles. To you." She let out her breath in a soft sight. "But it means a lot that you offered."

[wegoyougo]

"I understand," Hank said. "For a long time I didn't really have anyone so it's different for me, too. Suddenly having you guys here, I mean. Admitting it is the first step, though, right? We should make an effort to change how we think. Nobody should have to feel like they're alone."

(And especially with the completion of his serum they wouldn't ever have to cause they'd look normal!!!11!1)

[notsogroovy]

"You're not. You have us. Me." Raven flashed him a smile and leaned forward, a hand on his chest, and kissed the corner of his mouth. She hesitated for a minute and then slid an inch to the left so that she was kissing him full on the lips. She wanted an actual kiss from him and now she was pretty sure he'd bolt, but at least she could say that she'd had the one.

[wegoyougo]

Hank did come very close to bolting, made obvious by the way his entire body suddenly tensed as though he were ready to leap from the bed, stammer an excuse, and leave. Perhaps it would've been better that he had, too, but for some reason he stayed.

Once the first kiss was broken he leaned in and kissed her again. It was a tad clumsy – his inexperience was clear – but he didn't let it stop him.

[notsogroovy]

The first kiss was nice. She'd expected it to be nice and sweet and all the things she thought a first kiss should be. What she didn't expect was that he'd lean back in and kiss her a second time. She made a soft noise and leaned in closer, fingers curling a little in his shirt. She hadn't expected that their first kiss would be with her sprawled half across him in her bed.