As she was ranting, Lee didn't even notice the fact that Tarin wasn't properly looking at her, didn't notice that he was blankly looking over her shoulder. She didn't noticed or really think about much of anything until Tarin started his own little tirade back, though his tone was much calmer, softer, than hers had been.

Lee didn't have much of a chance to say anything else after that as she heard Sam's voice behind her asking how they were holding up. Ducking her head slightly, Lee wiped at the traitorous tears on her cheeks, tears that, even as they were falling, Lee didn't know why.

And then Lee's brain seemed to start working again, and she realized that after everything else, not only that had happened that day, but that had happened in the last week, month, year for them, it was now sleeping that they were fighting about. What the hell?

Well, at least it hadn't really been one of their bad fights, where there was yelling, followed by one of them storming off. Though, Lee thought as she opened her eyes and glanced at the look on Tarin's face before turning to look at Sam, that might not be all that far away.

"Thanks Sam," Lee said, adding to Tarin's thanks. Adding to? Ok, so maybe his jealousy and anger wouldn't boil over. At least that would make things a bit easier.

"I really don't know what I would have done if you hadn't come," Lee continued. "And, all things considered, I think we're doing better than expected." Well, at least Lee thought Tarin was doing better than expected. She, on the other hand, had just freaked out at him. Normally if she freaked or broke down after one of Tarin's merges, it was after he had passed out, though normally, she would have also siphoned energy from him to cause him to pass out.

"What about you, Sam? Are you alright?" Lee didn't want Sam, or anyone, really hurt because she couldn't deal with Tarin's merging on her own, after all.

"Thanks. I'm doing alright." "Thanks by the way...Lee said you took the brunt of what happened. I guess the good Doctor has been to see you already. Is everyone else alright?"

"I really don't know what I would have done if you hadn't come," "And, all things considered, I think we're doing better than expected." "What about you, Sam? Are you alright?"

Sam just nodded to both of them still with a friendly smile on his face, “I’m fine, actually got burned for the first time in my life… you were like an inferno…” Sam’s smile disappeared to a serious one, “Sara is in another ward healing right now and as far as I know Garret hasn’t come back yet, so I have no idea about him but as far as I know everyone else got off okay…” Sam’s mind tracked back to Sara and her tattoo on her back and the a thought occurred ‘need to see her next…’

Sam looked to Tarin with a friendly smile on his face again, “Yea the Doc got to me, only have a few bruises but with ice surrounding the area it goes down in a few hours.” Sam then looked to Lee and said, “Glad you called actually, if you didn’t call we might have not shown up on time and if we showed up we would be doing more of a clean up than a rescue. Sides what better way to play with fire than Ice?” Once again he thanked his lucky stars he had the ability of ice. Sam then thought about it, “as far as I know the police will probably blame a mutant but without any way of finding you I am pretty sure you won’t have to worry…” Sam the thought about it and if he needed to he still had his fake but extremely believable government badge in his wallet and if needed he was willing to throw that around.

Sam then chose his next words carefully as he spoke hopeing they would come out the way he wanted them to. He looked to Tarin with again a concerned look on his face, “So…Tarin was that the first time something like that happened?”

Lee didn't respond to what he'd said about the sleeping, she really didn't have a chance to. Tarin couldn't say he was upset about that though. Sam's distraction might be just the thing they needed to get Lee of her tirade. In fact, Tarin felt a little vindicated by the fact that he'd gotten the last word in the "argument" if it could even be called that. A glance showed Lee swiping away tears and Tarin felt a little pang of guilt in spite of himself and sighed, reaching out to rub her back in a reassuring way as Sam spoke.

A few moments later Lee was chatting with Sam, still perched on the side of Tarin's bed, and Tarin pulled himself into a more upright position to better regard the guy standing in his little area of the infirmary. The effort wasn't without pain and Tarin groaned slightly at the stiffness starting to set into his muscles. What had they done to him to stop the merge? Usually he felt fantastic...at least physically, after one. This time was different though. He hurt.

Sam confirmed what Lee had said, nobody was dead. Tarin heaved a sigh of relief at that knowledge, as well as the knowledge that everyone who had been hurt was in the infirmary receiving the same expedited treatment that Sam and Lee had received. "Well," he said, nodding to Sam's descriptions of his injuries, "I'm sorry for any discomfort I caused, and glad for the help."

The police. In all of this, Tarin hadn't really given them a thought besides what they could do the mutants at the mansion if it was discovered they'd helped him. The thousands of property damage he'd done on his own hadn't even occurred to Tarin and now he frowned, hoping that Sam was right, "I just hope that the poor other guy doesn't get blamed for what happened..." I couldn't take another thing like that on my conscious."

Then Sam asked if this had happened before. Tarin bit off several sarcastic replies to the effect of, "Mind your own business" and thought for a few moments, staring down at the white linen bedsheets as he considered his options. Sam obviously wasn't in charge here, but he probably knew the person who was. Resisting questions like this, even from an underling would reflect poorly on him. Tarin knew if he was hoping to walk out of here with no confrontation, making a good impression was paramount.

"I wish I could tell you it was." he said softly, brows knitted together in consternation. "It's happened several times before..." and this was the most mild, with the least life loss... he added silently in his head, deciding that was information that didn't necessarily need to be public knowledge at this point in time. "You wouldn't have known though, it's different every time."

Ok, everything seemed to be different about that day. Normally when their fights, or the stress after a merge, hit their turning point, it was when she and Tarin started joking around a bit with each other. There was no joking this time, but as she sat on the bed beside him looking over at Sam, Lee felt Tarin's hand on her back, rubbing slightly.

But for some reason, Sam seemed rather happy - well happy wasn't quite the right word, but Lee honestly wasn't sure what was - that he had been there to help with the merge. And, he did have a bit of a point about the police; though they would be looking for the mutant who did all that damage, Tarin wasn't actually physically visible during any of it.

Then Sam asked the question: if anything like that had happened before. Lee didn't answer, it wasn't her place to answer, that was up to Tarin. Plus, Lee didn't think it would go over well at all if she were to talk about any of the other merges, merges that often resulted in attempts on her life. Nope, definitely not something that would be good to bring up.

So instead of answering, Lee reached out and took Tarin's hand, squeezing slightly. Yet, even though she didn't feel it was her place to answer Sam's question, it was starting to seem like Tarin wasn't going to either. Looking over at him, Lee saw Tarin just staring at the bedsheets in front of him.

Finally, he did answer, though he really didn't go into any sort of details about it. Not that that was really surprising to Lee, though Lee wasn't sure Sam would be all that pleased with such a vague answer. "Yeah, it's never been pretty when it's happened before..." Lee said softly, her eyes still on Tarin.

Sam just nodded in response to both Lee and Tarin’s comments. It was a sensitive subject from what he could tell and he wasn’t one to normally pry but this was a dangerous situation. Sam cleared his throat and began to spoke as calmly as he could, “I know this isn’t any of my businesses but I need a better answer than that.” Sam paused for a second and then spoke again, “Seeing how you almost turned a city block into cinders, you owe some people an explanation.” Sam eyed Tarin for a second hopeing he would talk, “didn’t you ask me about this place not to long ago? Well this is what we do here… we talk!” Sam felt like a hypocrite for saying this on several occasions not only did he lie to Lee but to almost everyone else in the mansion about his past. He still wasn’t ready to talk about it but this was different, Sam wasn’t putting peoples lives in trouble Tarin was.

Sam waited patiently for one of them to respond, he thought that Lee would be the first to speak seeing as he got the vibe that Tarin would like nothing more to beat Sam. Sam had no problems with Tarin but if he refused to talk Sam didn’t know what he would do. He was trying to help him that’s all he wanted tot do was help.

A better answer. Tarin clenched his teeth so tightly he could feel the muscle in one side of his jaw jumping with the tension. That was only going to bring on a headache so he took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a second.

Sam went on and Tarin's eyes snapped open, wide on Sam's before they narrowed. "How dare you." he said, face contorted as he strove to control his temper.

It took a few moments, but Tarin pulled himself together enough to look at Sam again. "This this is exactly why I haven't come to talk to you people yet. I'm not a criminal and it's not my fault. I was worried you would treat me like one and here you are standing here...leveling the damage I did and demanding a better explanation like you're some judge and I'm on trial."

It didn't help that Sam had dated his fiance for about 3 seconds...it didn't help at all, and Tarin's anger continued to flare as he tried to compose himself enough to make a coherent answer. "You were the first one to tell me that this wouldn't happen, now you're the one standing in here doing it."

Tarin sat for a few more moments, "Yeah, it's happened before. Yeah, it's been just as violent if not more. I need help. I know I need help."

This was not going well, not going well at all. Not only was there someone pressing Tarin about details regarding his merging, something that he hated to share at the best of times, that person was Sam. Definitely not good.

From the moment that Lee felt Tarin tense beside her at Sam's words, her mind was racing, trying to come up with the best way to put things, the best way to truthfully explain about the merging without going into too much detail, especially about that last merge...

But then Tarin did open his mouth to speak, something Lee didn't think he was actually going to do.

His words weren't exactly what Lee was hoping to hear, though.

"Try and calm down, Tarin," Lee said softly, gently, looking over at her fiance for a moment. Then she turned her eyes back to Sam, though the softness in them was all but gone. "He does have a bit of a point, though. We're here to get help, to try and learn how to control this so it never happens again, not to be put on trial for it. Cause honestly, if that's all we're going to get here, I'd rather give the pleasure of execution to someone else.

"I think he would have actually pulled the trigger this time if he'd had a gun this morning, and all I did was ask for a coffee," Lee continued.

"So," Lee asked after taking a deep breath. "Do you think we can get some real help, or should we just go wait for Rupert to get off work so he can 'help' us?"

The situation to Sam seemed to progress a little for the worse in hi opinion. Sam didn’t want to risk offending neither Lee nor Tarin, but his opinion had to be heard on the situation and help clear things up. Sam stood still as Tarin said his thoughts Sam nodded slightly in response to them as he said, “Tarin I understand how you feel, by all means we want to help you, and there is no way I think you're a criminal.” Sam paused as he put his hands on his head for a second to find the right words. “Tarin we aren’t putting you on trial by any means, we just need to know what exactly happens. That’s the best way we can help you is y understanding the entire situation.” Sam then finished Tarin’s next word with a nod, “I hope we can be the ones to help you, I really do.”


Sam paused for a second and then looked over to Lee slightly frowning, “we would never play executioner, if that was the case I would have left this place a long time ago, we are here to help. It’s your choice if you want it here or to be,” Sam held up his fingers and quoted, “executed.”

Sam pulled up a chair from behind a curtain and out it facing the bed Tarin and Lee were both sitting in, “personally I think your best shot is here. Here we can help you if your mutation ever gut’s out of control again, plus if you ever end up getting hurt we have one of the best healers… which can always come in handy.” Sam looked to Tarin and then to Lee, noticing how tired both of them look to him, ‘must be draining’ thought Sam.

Lee was telling him to calm down, but Tarin didn’t want to calm down, in fact, that was the last thing he wanted. Sam was really starting to piss him off, and worst of all, they weren’t getting anywhere. The anticipation was getting to be too much. Tarin stopped for a moment and marvelled at the fact that he was so calm about this whole situation then shuddered, realizing that it was all going to hit him at some point. He was exhausted, absolutely exhausted, the last few months having taken their toll on him mentally and physically.

Lee started talking about executions and Tarin shot her a quizzical look thinking that they’d better not be talking about executions. On the bright side, after telling him to calm down Lee had completely corroborated his sentiments. Then she brought up Rupert. Instantly, Tarin’s face tightened and he almost visibly winced. Since the night he’d found himself covered in blood and handcuffed to a chair, thanks to their detective friend, Tarin had seen neither hide nor hair of the man. Lee, however, appeared to have seen him, recently. Eyebrow raised, Tarin looked at Lee, “Really?” he said, almost under his breath, still slightly surprised that Lee had even seen Rupert, let alone had a long enough conversation that the man had wanted to shoot her. They’d talk about that more later, there was no need to bring up anything that would connect him to the murders earlier in the year. At least not yet.

The golem was talking again, having decided he was wanted at some point and dragging a chair from apparent oblivion to root himself even further into unwanted visitation. Tarin fixed him with a deadpan stare, “Then stop treating me like a criminal in an interrogation room. I’ve been there before, the conversation to this point has borne shocking resemblance.” Sam went on to say that he was sure Tarin’s best shot was staying there, Tarin just laughed, “You got lucky today.” He said, a bitter cast to his mouth, “That...that…thing, was weak as hell compared to some. You are right about the healer though.”

Looking to Lee, Tarin thought, mulled, and puzzled over what the next step was. Honestly, he didn’t know, “I don’t think I’m ready to bare my soul yet.” He said finally, “There’s too much more that needs done first. I’m assuming we’re not being held here, since you’re just here to help if I want it.”

That said, Tarin swung his legs around and sat on the edge of the infirmary bed, facing away from Sam and wincing again at the stiffness permeating his muscles. Casting a glance in Sam’s direction, over his shoulder, Tarin smiled that same, bitter smile. “Besides. It’s not like anyone was killed.” this time, he thought.

“Lee…you feel up to leaving?” he asked.

Despite how quiet the word was, Lee clearly heard the surprise in Tarin's voice when he asked about her seeing Rupert. Or maybe it was because of her comment about how Rupert had seemed ready to shoot her. But really, wasn't that normal with Rupert?

Then Sam started talking again. Maybe with her run in with Rupert, and then the merge, had unsettled Lee more than she had thought, with all that talking about execution because of his powers. Or maybe she was just suicidal in a way she had never considered...

Before she knew what was going on, Lee heard Tarin laughing, though it didn't sound right. Didn't sound natural, normal, as he told Sam that this merge had been weak. Her eyes lowered to the bed at this point, Lee thought about it. Sure, there had been the fire, which had prevented Lee from getting close, stopped her from really being able to do anything, but that was because of the heat, not really because he had been powerful. There really hadn't been much of a fight once Sam had gotten a hold of the merged being.

Silently, Lee nodded her agreement with Tarin that this merge hadn't been all that strong, hadn't been all that bad, despite the amount of property damage that had been caused. The worst one hurt this time had been Sam, and even before the DocProf had gotten to him, it hadn't been that bad.

Again, and again silently, Lee had to agree that having a healer available would come in very hand when something like this happened again, not for Tarin, but for her. Though, if having a healer meant others were going to be in danger too because they'd be coming to help every time...Lee wasn't sure it was worth it. She'd survived through all her injuries thus far, even the broken collar bone, she could keep doing it if needed.

And yes, Lee had stopped lying to herself about the possibilities of merges happening. She knew that it was going to keep happening, knew that it was a matter of when not if. It made no sense not being ready for the next time because she had lied to herself about the possibility of it happening again.

But then Tarin asked her a question that she wasn't ready for, and Lee looked up at him in surprise. His feet were hanging off the edge of the bed now because he had turned. "I said I was ok," Lee reminded Tarin, though to be honest there really had been very little to show that fact since he had woken up. But then again, physical and emotional wellbeing were two totally different things, and Lee didn't have to be ok emotionally to be able to leave. "So if you want to, we can.

"Thanks Sam," Lee said softly, looking over to the other man for the first time in what felt like forever. "For everything. Thank you."

Sam could tell that Tarin didn’t like him, not one bit. Which Sam somewhat understood after all Sam had gone out with Lee once and had kissed her…well stolen a kiss from her which he thought would have worked out perfectly for them cause they were together now right? So if anything Tarin should love Sam for causing Lee to run back to him right? Sam nodded to Tarin, “I am not interrogating you I am only asking you, and yes,” Sam nodded to Tarin, “We aren’t holding you here your free to leave when you feel up to it.” Sam got the j=hint that he wanted Sam gone and got up from the chair and moved it back behind a curtain and stood there.

Sam nodded to Tarin and Lee, as they both seemed ready to go. “Well I wish you the best of luck.” Sam smiled to Lee who thanked him, “If something like this happens again, don’t hesitate to call…” Sam looked to Tarin and said, “That goes for you to, if you need questions answered about this place feel free to call.” Sam thought about reaching out for a handshake but then decided against it, Sam had a strong hunch that Tarin would not take the shake. Sam nodded once more and headed off in the direction of Sara to question the kitty about a certain tattoo.

Lee was quiet except for the exception of her agreeing that she was ready to leave. Tarin was alright with that, his head was pounding a little to compound the stiffness in his joints and muscles left over after the merge. Knowing that she was there and supporting him at every turn here was enough, she didn't need to say anything to show him.

Tarin stood up unsurprised when his legs felt a little shaky under him. It reminded him of how he felt in the morning after a grueling football practice in the summer when he'd been in junior high. The pain wasn't excruciating by any means, but it was uncomfortable. At least they didn't insist on hospital clothing here, he couln't help but thing as he waited for Lee.

Sam had taken the hint at some point and after rambling about how Tarin could call if he needed any help. "Will do..." he said in reply, though his tone might have suggested something different entirely.

Tarin waited for Lee to stand and ready herself, then led the way out, walking as sturdily as his stiff legs would allow. He just wanted to get home.