“Listen, you little shit,” Logan growled in Todd’s face, his fists wrapped in the younger man’s shirtfront and pulling him up onto his toes, “don’t get cute with me. What the hell are you doin’ here?”
Todd lifted his arms out to his sides in a shrug of sorts. “The professor asked me to come and help with the skin sampling.” At another, more menacing growl from Logan, Todd hastened to explain, “I’m a nursing student!”
Logan dropped him abruptly. Todd stumbled back a few steps, one hand catching the edge of the table to steady himself, the other going across his still-queasy stomach.
Rogue rose from her chair and stepped toward Todd, shaking off Logan’s restraining hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t know you were a nursing student,” she said in surprise.
Todd gave her another weak smile. “Yeah. But how could you know? It’s not like we ever talked before that psych project.”
“I just assumed you were a psych major like me since we had so many of the same classes.”
Shaking his head, the sick look finally fading from his face, Todd explained, “Nursing students at our school have to take a minimum of four psych classes. In theory, a lot of the problems patients face – especially with chronic or terminal illnesses – are going to be psychological. We’re supposed to be able to listen to what they’re saying and watch their behaviors for any signs of depression or other stuff.”
“‘Other stuff’ huh?” Rogue asked with a smirk. “That medical terminology?”
Todd gave her a cheeky grin. “Yup.”
“Let’s cut the chit-chat,” Logan rasped, having moved to stand next to Kurt. “You’re here for a skin sample, so get it over with.”
Hesitating over his answer, Todd looked at Kurt pleadingly.
“Oh,” Kurt said with surprise, “right. Vell, since Todd is most likely going to spend ze return trip much like he spent ze trip up, it might be best if ve stay here tonight, and do ze sampling in ze morning, ja?”
“No,” Logan said stubbornly.
At the same time, Rogue asked, “What? How’d he spend the trip up?”
Todd sighed. “He meant every time he teleported, I puked. Well, I only puked the first four or five times. Dry heaves after that.”
“Oh,” Rogue said, the look on her face making it clear she was sorry she had asked.
Logan laughed harshly. “Good. That means you should leave tonight. Nothin’ to puke up. It’ll be a different story in the mornin’.”
Kurt looked like he might be swayed by that reasoning, as he kept glancing down at his feet and grimacing.
“You get splashed, elf?” Logan asked with amusement.
“Ja,” Kurt said sadly, “many times.”
“I’m sorry!” Todd cried, embarrassed.
Kurt looked up and smiled reassuringly, his pointed teeth ruining the effort. “I know, and I’m not angry wit you. You couldn’t help it, after all. I vould just prefer to avoid repeating ze experience if I could.”
Todd laughed nervously. “Ah, yeah, me too.”
“We should let them stay, Logan,” Rogue urged, grabbing his flannel-covered elbow.
Looking down at her pleading expression, Logan felt his resolve weakening. Before he gave in, though, Todd interrupted.
“No, we’ll leave tonight, Rogue. Logan’s right about my stomach, and if we stayed, we wouldn’t be able to leave until tomorrow night. Can’t travel during the day.”
“I had not thought of zat,” Kurt said musingly.
“Plus,” Todd continued, “we only have the bare minimum necessary for transporting the skin samples. Hank designed the containers for a window of only a couple hours or so. After that, the samples won’t be kept cool and the tissue will start to degrade, and we already spent about thirty minutes getting up here.”
“Couldn’t you just keep them in the refrigerator?” Rogue asked, confused.
Todd laughed. “Not exactly. The containers don’t just regulate temperature. There are a couple other things Hank tried to explain to me – vacuum storage and particulate suppression? Something like that – that I just didn’t understand. But yeah. Short answer, no, can’t use the fridge.”
“Oh,” Rogue acknowledged in a smile voice. With a sigh, she flopped back into her chair and rolled up her sleeves, presenting her arms. “Get on with it then.”
Todd was clearly surprised, but hesitated no more than a few seconds before swinging his bag off his shoulders and rummaging through it. He took out eight containers and lined them up on the table after removing a small glass vial from each and setting them to one side of the table. A black marker and rolls of gauze and sterile padding followed, as well as an unmarked brown bottle. A second bottle, this one clear, was next. The last thing Todd pulled out of his bag looked a bit like a staple gun.
Rogue looked immediately to Logan when she saw it. He was leaning back against the refrigerator, his arms crossed tightly over his chest and a scowl on his face.
He looks nervous, Rogue mused.
‘Course he does, dummy, her voice answered. He’s worried about you, and he was basically tortured in that lab. Medical tools are bound to make him a bit twitchy.
True, Rogue conceded, recognizing on some level that her preoccupation with Logan was keeping her from getting anxious about the procedure. She didn’t even flinch when Todd swabbed her right forearm with the cold disinfectant from the brown bottle. Next, he swabbed the spot with the liquid from the clear bottle, the slight tingling numbness telling her it was a topical anesthetic. She ignored him when he loaded one of the glass vials into the base of the gun. She still didn’t flinch when he placed the sample gun against her skin. Her eyes stayed on Logan even when Todd pulled the trigger and the gun gouged into her skin with a hiss. So she saw that, while she didn’t flinch, Logan did.
When Todd pulled the vial from the gun, a messy bit of her flesh flopped against the glass and Logan closed his eyes briefly as though he were in pain. From the corner of her eye, Rogue saw Todd drop the vial into one of the canisters, flip the lid back on, and scrawl “Rt. forearm” on the blank label. He wiped the wound with a pad soaked in the disinfectant, pausing to look at Rogue curiously when she didn't react to the burning sensation, and then taped a soft guaze pad over it. They repeated the process seven times, and Rogue remained silent and unflinching as skin was cut from her right and left biceps, her left forearm, her stomach and back, and both thighs. While it was somewhat awkward shifting her clothing around and maneuvering so she could keep Logan in sight, she managed it all without looking away from him once. Kurt had courteously left the room when she dropped her jeans for the skin samples from her legs. He reappeared as Todd was snapping the lid on the last container.
“Are you all right, Rogue?” he asked, his blue face scrunched in a worried frown.
Rogue nodded wordlessly.
“And you, Todd? You’re looking a bit pale.”
Todd waved Kurt's question off as he packed everything back into his bag. “I’m fine. Just need a glass of water.” Casting another curious glance at Rogue, Todd shrugged and moved to the sink. The first cupboard he tried, the one to the right of the sink, held the glasses, and he carefully pulled one down and filled it. He drained the glass quickly and immediately refilled it. Turning around to face the room’s other occupants, he lost his balance and the glass slipped from his fingers.
Logan and Rogue, intent on each other, didn’t notice what was happening. When the glass hit the floor and shattered, the sound deafening in the quiet room, Logan jumped and his claws shot out as he turned toward Todd.
And Rogue disappeared with a bamf, leaving behind a cloud of blue smoke and the smell of sulfur.