Rebecca should have been there. Worse; she could have been there. She could have ridden with Gawain to the Halloween party and ended up being there to back him up when everything to a trip to the Upside-Down.

Arriving at the party together would have felt like a date, which was explicitly not what it was. Several friends were all getting together as a group to celebrate Halloween at a big party in the city. Becca and Jules arrived together and Gawain would show up for fun and flirting and wherever else the night would take them. It was noncommittal, though Becca had spent the better part of three days teasing Gawain with her costume.

Gawain never arrived at the party. Becca distinctly remembered feeling annoyed with him for standing her up and with herself for thinking she was being “stood up.” Gawain probably changed his plans and met up with someone else for the night, which was a d*ck move as a friend, but otherwise, something he was totally within his right to do.

It was almost midnight when Becca wobbled off the dance floor and checked her phone. No messages from Gawain-going-on-Maya, but she did have an alert. Her heart plummeted. An assault on a hotel, a playground in flames, and an irradiated parking garage. There was an open call for X-Men assistance and one of their own was down. Gawain had been in the parking garage.

Sitting in an uncomfortable seat next to Maya’s hospital bed, Rebecca grumbled, ”Jist hae tae be th’ hero.” It had been a long night and she had spent it in the Mansion infirmary. DocProf was doing the best he could, but he was a doctor, not a healer, and Maya was in a bad way.

In theory, Maya was lucky. DocProf was convinced her radiation poisoning would not be fatal, but she still had radiation poisoning, along with plenty of other traumas from her night facing off against demons and monsters. The mirrorwalker had been unconscious since the night before, but that did not stop the fever or the vomiting. Rebecca chose to stay with her friend, making sure her head remained facing the side with a bucket on standby. It was not a pretty night, but after all Maya went through, Rebecca refused to let the girl succumb to choking on her own vomit.

Dawn was finally breaking through the window and Rebecca had spent precisely three minutes sleeping. She almost dozed off around three am, before the sounds of retching jolted her awake. Maya’s bed was sectioned off with curtains, which Rebecca appreciated since she was still in costume. Fate was a funny mistress; when Rebecca picked a skimpy black and red nurse costume, the last thing she expected was to end up with an actual patient.

And yet, with DocProf tending to several other patients, Rebecca was up on her feet, covering her yawn with one hand while pressing the back of the other against Maya’s forehead. She frowned, not liking how hot Maya still was to the touch. ”Dammit, Maya…”

Maya was floating in some strange neverland that sucked in very creative ways. Sometimes it was the parking garage hellscape filled with all kinds of twisted figures; sometimes it was just pain all over and cramps that made her throw up even way after she had run out of things to throw up at all. Sometimes it was a numb, silent thing, a form of sleep paralysis, where she struggled to either wake up or pass out, but could do neither. Am I in a coma?... Boy, that **** would *** suck.

She lost her sense of time a while ago. She was vaguely aware that she was Maya, but which Maya day it was, she did not know. She hurt everywhere, inside and out, and felt like she was going to be nauseous for ever.

When the cramps came again, Maya made a small whimpering noise, curling up as she lay on her side. There was really nothing in her to throw up, but that only made the feeling worse, in a way, with no chance of relief. She sniffled as someone placed a cool hand on her forehead.

>>”Dammit, Maya…”

Becca?

"Sgoo" Maya muttered, with her eyes closed. She liked the cool hand. It brought a shred of clarity. She was somewhere in a bed, and Becca was there too. Infirmary?... Likely. "Sgoinon..."

It was tough seeing Maya in the state she was in. Her face was drained of color except for a tint of green, and she was shiny with sweat. Maya needed a bath desperately, but after a night of dancing and taking care of her sick friend, Rebecca was in no position to judge.

As Rebecca’s long yawn wrapped up and she prepared to return to her uncomfortable chair for the next hour, she felt Maya stirring beneath her hand. The subtle movement grabbed her attention just in time for Maya to mutter out the first words she managed all night. Well, almost words.

Finally finding a soft smile, Rebecca brushed aside some of the hair plastered to Maya’s face. ”Ur ye awake? Yer in th’ infirmary. Ah’m here wi’ ye, it’s November first, an’ yer safe.” She spoke slowly and clearly, hoping Maya was coherent and conscious enough to understand the rundown. ”Hoo dae ye feel?”

Okay, so after a few moments of observation, being awake sucked worse than being halfway dead. Maya was not a fan of it. She was keenly aware of the pain from all the bruises and injuries, as well as the cramps in her stomach, and she felt like she had a very bad sunburn all over. The one thing hez hazy mnd was glad for was that she had not been awake for the shifting.

>> ”Ur ye awake? Yer in th’ infirmary. Ah’m here wi’ ye, it’s November first, an’ yer safe.”

The voice, and the hand, were definitely Becca's. Maya whimpered again as she tried to open her eyes. Looking made things worse. Go figure. At least the basic information of what Becca was saying went through: Halloween was over, and she was safe.

>>”Hoo dae ye feel?”

That would have been hard to put into words, so Maya groaned and made some miserable noises, before she attempted to blink her eyes open again. Halloween. Monsters. Utter craziness...

"C'leste?..."

Spending so much of her time with Maya in costume, Rebecca knew how strong her friend was. When she thought of a true hero, Maya fit the bill. It was hard to see her in such a weakened state. As she struggled to seize consciousness, the whimper that escaped her throat broke Rebecca’s heart. She was certain she had never seen Maya as beaten up as she was there, laying in a hospital bed.

And just like a true hero, Maya’s first response to how she was feeling had nothing to do with her own state. Maya wanted to know about one of the other people from the parking garage. In an effort to understand what her friend dealt with, Rebecca spent time talking to paramedics and talking through reports. Celeste was a name that came up multiple times because she was at the center of the nuclear event and, unfortunately, she was in the worst condition.

”Celeste is… alive.” Could anyone fault her for looking at the positives first? ”She’s alive, but she’s in bad shape. Celeste is in a coma.” Rebecca knew the girl as a student at the Mansion. Celeste did not take English, so she only knew the girl in passing, but Rebecca’s heart ached for her condition. The X-Men signed up to run into trouble, but Celeste was a student and a civilian.

There had been other people in that parking garage. Others that were stuck there, fighting for their lives, trying and failing not to be affected by whatever psychic storm had been conjured up. One of them was a girl from Impact's team. The dude with the wind powers... and Celeste. While Maya liked to make sure people were okay, especially in messed up situations like this, Celeste had been her primary focus. Celeste was not a fighter, she was a Mansion student, and she had very dangerous powers. And Maya, in the end, failed to protect her.

>>”Celeste is… alive. She’s alive, but she’s in bad shape. Celeste is in a coma.”

Maya groaned again. "Dammit..." she muttered, rolling over and reaching up to run her eyes. Everything hurt still. "Told 'er to run..."

Becca grimaced when Maya groaned. After enduring such a terrible night, the last thing Maya needed was more pain, physically or emotionally. Becca hated to be the bearer of bad news, but Maya cared too much to let herself focus on recovery, oblivious to what happened to everyone else.

Apparently, Maya was feeling guilty because she could not get Celeste to leave the area before things went wrong. Somehow, broken in a bed, Maya still found a way to shoulder the weight of the world. ”Thaur was naethin' she coods hae dain. Th' zones those lasses created waur tay wide tae rin awa' frae.” Rebecca would have to fill Maya in on the bigger picture; the parking garage was not the only place effected. Three sisters and dozens of people caught in the line of fire.

And speaking of the line of fire… ”Ah dinnae think Celeste coods hae ran anyway. Afair she went nuclear, somethin' in thaur caught 'er. She has a pretty nasty stab woond frae a dagger...”

>>”Thaur was naethin' she coods hae dain. Th' zones those lasses created waur tay wide tae rin awa' frae.”

So, it was mutant activity, not the world ending. Again. Maya tried to piece her memories together, but none of them made any sense. Most of it, she remembered upside-down for some reason, and then there were people, and colors, and a storm... Maya groaned as thinking got too much, and rubbed her forehead. What a damn mess...

>>”Ah dinnae think Celeste coods hae ran anyway. Afair she went nuclear, somethin' in thaur caught 'er. She has a pretty nasty stab woond frae a dagger...”

So Celeste did not only not get away, did not only go nuclear, but she had been hurt too. With a...

"Oh sh*t" Maya's eyes opened wide this time. She remembered stabbing the witch, or what she thought was the witch, after the X-girl flung him around some monster and there were mirrors and... "I stabbed Celeste?!"

If Rebecca was in Maya’s position, she knew she would want to be told what happened after she went down. Protecting someone from the truth was all well and good, but some people needed the truth. Maya had to know what happened to Celeste and the others.

It was delayed, but Maya reacted to the news, getting more animated than she had been all night. Rebecca placed a hand on Maya’s shoulder, hoping to keep her in place; DocProf warned that Maya needed to keep unnecessary moving to a minimum, and she certainly did not need to get worked up. ”Maya, Ah—Maya, calm doon, and—huh?”

Since Rebecca was so focused on being concerned with Maya’s recovery, it took her a second to process the other woman’s words. Celeste did not just get stabbed; Gawain stabbed her. The redhead’s mouth hung open for a moment as she realized the bomb she just dropped on her friend. ”Ah… um…” It took her a second to come up with words, because how did you comfort someone who just stabbed a civilian.

You remind them it was not their fault. ”It was an accident, an’ ye were nae in control. Th’ woman, th’ witch, she had ye aw whammied. She was in yer head. Thes is nae oan ye, Maya…”

Dammit.
Dammit, dammit, dammit.
Dammit.

Celeste was in a coma, she did not make it out of the parking garage okay, and on top of all that, it had been Mirror and her stupid dagger that put her in the coma. She had just woken up, and things were already in hell in a hand basket.

>>”Maya, Ah—Maya, calm doon, and—huh?”

Even foggy on drugs and pain, Maya could tell that Becca was feeling guilty for breaking the news. Did she not... did people not know where the dagger came from? If had been a part of her costume, or rather, a costume-appropriate weapon she carried just in case... But everything in that garage had been so chaotic, it was no wonder no one knew the details yet. How long had it been? Did she say? One day?...

>>”It was an accident, an’ ye were nae in control. Th’ woman, th’ witch, she had ye aw whammied. She was in yer head. Thes is nae oan ye, Maya…”

"Yeah but I'm an X..." Maya muttered, rolling over on her side again "... an dis wa'n't even my first Halloween sh*tstorm..."

Convincing Maya not to blame herself for Celeste’s injury was not going well. At the end of the day, it was Maya’s dagger that put did much of the damage to the nuclear girl. Mind tricks or not, Maya felt like she failed.

Despite her best efforts, Maya rolled on her side, turning away from Rebecca. The redhead worried that dwelling on such a mistake would put Maya on the path to the kind of self-doubt that ended a career. Taking a seat on the edge of the bed next to Maya, Rebecca’s hand absentmindedly rubbed her friend’s back.

”Ah gie it, Maya,” she admitted in a soft voice. ”If Ah was in yer place, Eh'd be beatin' myself up, tay. Celeste is hurt, aye, but she’s alive. If ye werenae thaur, we dornt know hoo mony people woods hae died. Th' witch was feckin' wi' yer min', but ye waur daein' everythin' tae try savin' everyain aw oan yer ain.”

Rebecca sighed, not sure if she was making things better or worse, but pressing forward anyway. ”It didne gang weel, but ye did everythin' onie ay us woods hae dain. Dornt second guess yerself.” If Gawain stabbed a civilian, anyone who knew him knew something was at work screwing with his mind, and Maya must have known that too, somewhere deep down.

”Sides, it’s hard tae save th’ day when yer back-up is oer at some party,” she added with a degree of disappointment in her voice. If Rebecca had gone to the party with Gawain, she would have been with him when the Witches attacked. She was one of the few X-Men immune to telepathic attacks; how different would things have been if she had not been stubborn? The thought had been in the back of her mind all night.

Maya rolled over, but changing positions did not help any with either the nausea, or the guilt. Becca moved over to sit on the bed and rub her back. It was a small gesture, but it was comforting. Maya sighed. She felt thoroughly miserable.

>>”Ah gie it, Maya. If Ah was in yer place, Eh'd be beatin' myself up, tay. Celeste is hurt, aye, but she’s alive. If ye werenae thaur, we dornt know hoo mony people woods hae died. Th' witch was feckin' wi' yer min', but ye waur daein' everythin' tae try savin' everyain aw oan yer ain.”

"I hate it. The f*** Halloween psychics find me every time." Maya muttered. Really, could she not catch a break, and go to a party, just for once? She did her best, but her best was pretty bad. And Celeste had been hurt as a result. And people got radiation poisoning, as a result of that. It was nice to blame it all on the witch. Even if it would not last.

>>”It didne gang weel, but ye did everythin' onie ay us woods hae dain. Dornt second guess yerself. Sides, it’s hard tae save th’ day when yer back-up is oer at some party,”

"That is not fair" Maya glared up at Becca "You don't get to steal the pity party. And you're not my backup. You're... uhhh why are you dressed as a nurse?..."

Maya was quick to call Rebecca out when she started feeling sorry for herself. It seemed like a hypocritical stance to take, considering. ”Ah’m sorry, but ye dinnae own th’ patent oan self-loathing, sweetheart.”

Until Maya pointed it out, Rebecca’s costume had slipped her mind. If anyone else was around, it would have been an embarrassing realization, but with Maya, Rebecca just offered a weak smile. ”Oh, thes? Ah know yoo're out ay it, but thes is th' costume Ah've bin teasin' ye abit aw week.” Rebecca had not told Maya what she would be dressed as, but she assured her it was a sexy classic. The sexy nurse was a cliché, and one Juliette scolded her for, but it was an outfit Becca was sure she could rock.

It was not the ideal thing to wear in the middle of an infirmary, of course, but it could not be helped. ”Ah... huvnae exactly gain haem since lest nicht. At leest ye finally gie th' chance tae see it?” she added with a weak chuckle, trying to lighten the mood of an otherwise difficult morning.

Maya was slowly registering the fact that Becca was dressed as a nurse. Not the kind of nurse that one saw in hospitals, though; not exactly scrubs and ponytails, but rather... the kind of nurse people would see at parties. If she had been feeling less sick, Maya would have been distracted by the cleavage she had a great vantage point for.

>>”Oh, thes? Ah know yoo're out ay it, but thes is th' costume Ah've bin teasin' ye abit aw week. Ah... huvnae exactly gain haem since lest nicht. At leest ye finally gie th' chance tae see it?”

"You dressed up as a sexy nurse... for me?" Maya blinked, equally touched and amused. It was a classic, and it was hard to beat the classics. Especially with Becca's hair and figure. Maya chuckled a little, despite being dizzy, and rolled onto her other side. "If DocProf sees this, he's gonna have a cow."

The healer was not usually one for frivolous nonsense, and seeing someone in his Infirmary dressed as a sexy nurse might just push him into a rage fit.

"I appreciate it, though." Maya added with a small smile "I was gonna be a dashing musketeer, but I think that costume's pretty much busted... so I decided to be a messed up patient instead. I know I look hot as hell right now..."

With all the terrible events of the night before, it was nice to have a chance to take Maya’s mind off the worst of it, even if she was using her cleavage and a skimpy outfit to do so. With where Maya’s eyes drifted, her outfit’s lack of subtlety was quickly noticed.

Maya rolled closer to Becca and she took the opportunity to loop a freckled arm behind Maya’s back to keep her close. ”What can Ah say? Ah loch th’ way ye look at me,” she admitted, with a blush creeping onto her cheeks. ”An’ unfortunately, DocProf has seen thes. He tauld me he is busy reit noo, but rest assured, a coo will be hud.” Between DocProf and Jules, Becca was prepared for several speeches about fetishizing the healthcare industry and encouraging sexy nurse stereotypes.

As Maya guessed, her costume was damaged and removed before Becca could even arrive. She ran her fingers through Maya’s messy black hair. ”Ah’m sure ye waur very dashing. Points fur boldness, though; irradiated patient is tough tae pull aff.” Maya looked like hell. She was still beautiful, but she was also sopping with sweat and the lingering scent of recent vomit.

It would take a little time before Maya was up to full strength, which brought up the question of how to handle her medical needs in the meantime. ”DocProf says ye shooldnae hae tae stay haur lang, but if an’ when ye lae, he wants someain keepin' an eye oan ye. Ah was thinking… if ye’d loch, ay coorse, ‘at ye can crash at mah place sae Ah can take care ay ye.” She looked down at her outfit (and the display of cleavage under her chin,) and added, ”Thocht dornt expect thes every day. An' as bonnie a patient as ye ur, kissin' is still aff th' table until th' throwin' up passes.”

Becca hoped Maya did not take the invitation as forward; they were friends-with-benefits, but they were also friends in general. Becca would want to be there for any friend in Maya’s situation and she was sure Maya would prefer her apartment to being stuck in the infirmary for a week.